Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:
Voyager Capital, Access Venture Partners lead $8M Rapta round – Portland Business Journal
Rapta has created an AI platform that uses cameras and computer vision to help manufacturers achieve higher quality assurance results and fewer errors. It does this by watching an assembly and then alerting the human worker to correct or incorrect work.
How Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei’s Writings Help Explain A.I. Fears – The New York Times
“If you’re explaining, you’re losing,” Ronald Reagan is credited with saying. Silicon Valley disagrees. Ever since the drama around artificial intelligence began heating up, technologists have unleashed bushels of commentary.
(2009) If you’re talking about similar things, you’re probably Simler
If you’ve spent any time on any social network or microblogging platform anywhere, you know as well as I do that there is one request that tends to crop up far more than any other: “I wish we could have groups.”
Democrats now more worried than Republicans about AI, its impact on jobs | Pew Research Center
In a June Pew Research Center survey of U.S. adults, 56% of Democrats said they are more concerned than excited about AI’s increased use in daily life, compared with about half of Republicans. (Democrats and Republicans include independents who lean toward each party.)
Fast To $100M In ARR, High Spend, Low Burn: The Data Behind Top AI Startups
According to new data, a few markers can suggest whether you’re keeping pace, from how much of your growth is coming from new customers, to how aggressively you’re hiring, to how efficient you’re getting at bringing in each new dollar.
Why feeling like an imposter means your business is actually working (and what to do with it)
Imposter syndrome doesn’t show up when you’re playing it safe. It doesn’t arrive when you’re doing something familiar, when you’re staying inside what you already know, when everything feels comfortable and proven. Imposter syndrome shows up when you’re growing.
Why Salesforce may be AI’s adult in the room | The Deep View
The company doesn’t see this as a vehicle for job or SaaS replacement, but as an enterprise empowerment tool that is more precise, more secure, and more tailored to the AI needs of companies that use Salesforce. One of the big promises of AI has always been that it will automate away grunt work and processes that don’t add as much value. That’s what Salesforce is trying to deliver here.”The SaaS-pocalypse was not about the end of software, but it may be about the end of software that makes humans do all the work,” CEO Marc Benioff said during the Tuesday keynote.
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Introducing The Information’s 50 Most Influential People in Tech
Influence is different from power. Power is a blunt cudgel, often wielded for short-term gain. Influence is a more delicate tool that can potentially produce more enduring effects. Someone with influence puts forward new ideas that broadly shape the industry. Peers listen to people with influence and try to copy them. They command the respect of even the biggest egos. They develop tribes and followings, compounding their networks.
Read the History, Not Just the Code
You open the code. You read it. And pretty quickly you hit something strange. A weird conditional. A function that takes a parameter nobody passes. A workaround with a comment that says “do not remove” and no explanation of why. The code cannot tell you why any of that is there. Only the history can.
Al Gore says the real AI risk isn’t data centers | TechCrunch
In an interview with TechCrunch this week alongside Lila Preston, head of growth equity at their investment firm Generation Investment Management, Gore said emissions from AI data centers aren’t what should keep people up at night, despite the mounting opposition over their environmental impacts. What should concern people more, in his view, are the warnings coming from inside the AI industry itself, and he takes them seriously.
The Craft of Sales: Why the Best Job in Tech Right Now Is the One AI Can’t Do | First Round
Sure, LLMs make everything in service of sales easier, but there are some things they still can’t do. It’s tough to envision an AI SDR asking the exact right question at the exact right moment in a call, reading the power dynamics in a room and acting accordingly, training a champion to pitch to their decision committee without condescending them, or turning a prospect into a friend who wants you to win as badly as you do. And if I had to place a bet, I’d put all my chips on that continuing to be the case for many, many years to come.
Revant Optics names new CEO as founder Jason Bolt steps down – Portland Business Journal
Sixteen years after starting Revant Optics and three years after selling the company to a Canadian investor, Jason Bolt is handing over the CEO job to someone new.
Dolly Parton Was Not an Ally. She Was an Underwriter.
Here is the part that matters. She never traded her audience for comfort, and she never traded her convictions for her audience. Most people pick one. They either soften the position to keep the room, or they abandon the room and preach to people who already agree. She refused both. She stayed in the room and said the thing.
Portland’s Official Fashion Week – FashioNXT
FashioNXT has been leading the way in Portland’s elevation by staging the runway shows of leading independent designers from all around America in the iconic towers in downtown Portland.
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