Victor Cho

At Joint California Summit on Gen AI today hosted by Stanford and UC Berkeley, Kapor Center, San Francisco Foundation, CA Governors Office and others w/ top leaders from policy, research, philanthropy and community. Gavin Newsom brilliantly moderated a conversation with Fei-Fei Li and Jennifer Chayes on the risks and opportunities associated with #genai. It was very thought provoking--encourage you to check it out. After, I asked the new ChatGPT-4 to outline key opportunities and challenges associated with #ai in the ed sector. Here is what the advanced version produced: As we stand on the brink of an AI revolution, the education sector faces unprecedented opportunities and significant challenges. Opportunities: Personalized Learning: AI-driven platforms can tailor educational experiences to individual student needs, making learning more effective and engaging. Imagine a classroom where each student has a personalized tutor, adapting lessons in real-time based on their progress! Efficiency: AI can automate administrative tasks, allowing educators to focus more on teaching and student interaction. From grading assignments to managing schedules, AI can streamline operations and reduce workloads. Access to Education: AI can democratize education by providing high-quality resources to students in remote or underserved areas. Through online courses and virtual classrooms, we can bridge the gap and offer equal learning opportunities to all. Enhanced Engagement: Interactive AI tools, such as chatbots and virtual reality, can make learning more interactive and enjoyable. These technologies can bring subjects to life, sparking curiosity and a love for learning. Challenges: Data Privacy: With the increased use of AI, the collection and storage of student data raise significant privacy concerns. Ensuring robust data protection measures is crucial to maintaining trust and security. Equity Issues: While AI has the potential to provide access, it can also widen the gap if not implemented thoughtfully. Ensuring that all students have access to the necessary technology and resources is essential to prevent further disparities. Teacher Training: Educators need to be adequately trained to integrate AI tools into their teaching methods. Professional development and ongoing support are vital to harnessing the full potential of AI in education. Ethical Considerations: The use of AI in education must be guided by ethical principles. This includes addressing biases in AI algorithms and ensuring that the technology is used to support, not replace, the human elements of teaching and learning. As we navigate this transformative era, collaboration between educators, technologists, policymakers, and communities will be key to leveraging AI for the benefit of all learners. What are your thoughts on the role of AI in education? Share your insights and let's continue this important conversation! 🤖📚✨ #AIinEducation #EdTech #FutureOfLearning #InnovationInEducation

18

3 Comments

Where-to-Play: More Than Just Diversification? Roger Martin explores the strategic nuances of "Where-to-Play" (WTP) in this Playing to Win/Practitioner Insights piece. He challenges two prevalent views: - WTP as pure diversification: Exciting but potentially unfocused. - WTP as preordained: Limiting and reactive. Instead, Martin proposes a nuanced approach that leverages WTP for long-term advantage. * What are your experiences with WTP? * How can we move beyond the extremes and use WTP strategically? #strategy #business #playingtowin #rogermartin https://lnkd.in/dFv8imKP

1

What do you do when a radical new technology puts your main product right in the crosshairs of disruption? Listen to David Okuniev — co-founder of Typeform | Ask awesomely — discuss the challenges of innovation within existing structures. David shared a game-changing insight: Radical innovation is really, really difficult to do inside your own product. He emphasized the need to break free from the constraints of familiarity and embrace change from outside the box. Henrik Werdelin and I have both seen our fair share of this in our respective careers. What struck us most was how David leveraged structure to overcome the innovator’s dilemma. By creating a culture of experimentation and providing space for bold ideas, he propelled Typeform beyond incremental improvements. What other hacks have you seen or employed to help your organization overcome the innovator’s dilemma? Share your stories below! 👇 And if you want to dive deeper into our conversation, click the link in the comments to catch the full podcast episode!

4

2 Comments

Given the rapid decline in local media coverage and the questions about its economics, automated government transparency will become more critical. This is just the start of what can and should be done. Very excited to see how it plays out. Also curious how they solve issues around hallucinations (I assume they have a human in the loop?) and are likely using RAG to fine-tune/reduce risks of errors. #LLMs #AI

6

1 Comment

The most interesting people I follow in Mental Health... ↘ Alon Greenspan for perspectives from a VC dedicated to mental health ↘ Naveen Rao for insights on the Neurotech market ↘ Dr. Jessica Jackson for insights from a psychologist who's worked across the entire system ↘ John Torous, MD MBI for some of the only insights I can trust on the role ot technology in mental health care ↘ John Vervaeke for his lecture series on the crisis of meaning, absolutely incredible! ↘ Grin Lord for insights on AI in mental health ↘ Ross Harper for seeing the day-to-day of running a succesful mental health tech business ↘ Jonathan Haidt - for strong perspectives on how technology is affecting child mental health ↘ Nikhil Krishnan - for amazing education on health systems (not mental health specific) ↘ Ushma Baros for her writing on commercial strategy and GTM in mental health ↘ John Cordray for insights from the therapist side of the world (sorry, how many Johns are there in mental health???) ↘ Johann Hari - for some more alternative and holistic views on what is causing our mental health crisis ↘ Natasha Robinson - for on the ground reporting of the impact of mental health on real people ↘ Vlad Gheorghiu for evidence based perspectives on mental health in the workplace - Steve D. (me 👋 ) for insights on how to make your mental health business commercially successful Who did I miss? __ P.S. If you want insights on mental health innovation in your inbox every week, subscribe to The Hemingway Report 📩 #MentalHealth #HealthTech

147

39 Comments

Wonder what the future of authorship might look like? Check this out! (Yes, I’m still pinching myself after interviewing a hero earlier this week.) Writing is evolving into a collaborative dance with technology, akin to conducting rather than traditional pen-to-paper. Henrik Werdelin and I got to visions of the future with Steven Johnson, bestselling author of 13 books, including three of my all-time favorites. It was an incredible privilege to explore the product he's been dreaming of for decades, now brought to fruition thanks to generative AI, Google’s “NotebookLM.” In our discussion, we dove deep into how writing is evolving into a collaborative dance with technology. Authors will increasingly use AI tools not just to assist in writing but to actively shape and guide their creative process. Steven shared fascinating futures on how AI can suggest structures, outlines, and even drafts, transforming the creative process while raising important questions about authenticity and quality. However, we also discussed the potential downsides of this technological advancement, including the ease of generating content with AI could flood the market with material that lacks the human touch, prompting concerns about maintaining originality and artistic integrity. What are your thoughts on AI's role in writing? Do you see it as a tool for creativity or a potential threat to originality? Drop your comments below! Missed out on our chat? Don't worry! This is just a sneak preview of an episode we’ll be releasing in a couple of weeks. Stay tuned!

23

24 Comments

Over the past couple of years, there's been a noticeable decrease in the openness to share cutting-edge LLM research. I've been fortunate to have lead a group working on advanced Generative AI challenges and to have the opportunity to share our work publicly, potentially impacting a broader audience. Exciting news! Our research, centered on enhancing batch size scalability for LLMs, has been accepted at ICML 2024. We addressed the vital challenge of single-context batch sampling, crucial for generating multiple completions from one context, a common scenario in applications like code-editing IDE tools or ranking among multiple generations. Incremental decoding in such scenarios presents a memory IO-intensive challenge, particularly for large batches and context lengths. Our efforts improve efficiency, resulting in reduced latency, making it suitable for real-time applications such as massively-parallel answer generation without a significant increase in latency. Additionally, it enhances performance when paired with postprocessing techniques like reranking, contributing to overcoming the challenge of scaling model size for improved performance with reranking. Our solution introduces context-aware bifurcated attention, dividing attention in the generalized multi-query family into context and decoding components during incremental decoding. This bifurcation maintains the same computational complexity and delivers identical results as the original attention mechanism, while notably reducing memory IO costs and associated latencies in scenarios with large batch sizes and context lengths. This approach enables generating multiple real-time completions without incurring significant additional latency costs or allows for much larger batch sizes, thereby enhancing ranking performance. For example, using a 16B multi-head model with a 2k context length, we increased the batch size to 128 with bifurcated attention, compared to a batch size of only 5 without it, resulting in pass@k increasing from 59.0% to 84.6% Paper: https://lnkd.in/gXbhc4jT Kudos to the great team I had opportunity to work with Ben Athiwaratkun Sanjay Krishna Gouda Haifeng Qian qing sun Hantian Ding Ramesh Nallapati Sujan Gonugondla Jun Wang Sudipta Sengupta Bing Xiang

128

2 Comments

Looking forward to discussing how changing demographics and culture norms are affecting investment opportunities in longevity, health and well-being at The Care Summit today Alongside Cake Ventures' Monique Woodard, Ziegler's Dan Hermann, Oak HC/FT's Billy Deitch and JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s Jennifer Edwards, we’ll dive into the trends shaping how we are investing in the space: - Last year marked one of the most significant social and economic moments in modern times: The number of older adults—those aged 50 and over- surpassed the number of children under the age of 15 for the first time. - In 2020 the 50 plus population contributed $45 trillion to global GDP, or 34% of the total. That equates to about 3x the revenue of the world’s 100 highest- earning companies in 2020. - The U.S. population grew by 24.5 million from 2010 to 2022, and Hispanics accounted for 53% of this increase – a greater share than any other racial or ethnic group. - Women around the world and across all ages drive 64% of consumer spending

40

1 Comment

Greed and Fear, AI (adoption) style. In investments we're used to talking about greed vs fear, now we're seeing this same pendulum applies when it comes to consumer sentiment towards AI adoption. Concern is fear, that's obvious, and if you think about it a bit excitement comes from a form of greed in this case: the excitement for AI is because people hope it will help them do more with less time and effort invested - a greed for precious resources (which can be translated to money as well). Consumers need to invest some time, effort, as well as money in order to come up the AI learning curve (learning the right tools and how to prompt them). Playing around with AI is one thing, seriously using it professionally or personally is a bigger step that will be affected by the greed vs fear. It's too bad Pew Research Center didn't separate out professionals' opinions in a professional capacity (link to findings in the first comment), but still they find that for the first time the majority of Americans are concerned. The increase in concern (fear) happens just as research is starting to demonstrate that AI is making people more productive, which should have fueled excitement (greed). According to Ipsos, two thirds of people think AI will profoundly change their daily life in 3-5 years. Almost half say it already has (link in second comment). Interesting... And now this entire post rewritten by LI's AI: Greed and fear are familiar concepts in the world of investments, but did you know that they also apply to AI adoption? Consumer sentiment towards AI is swinging back and forth between concern and excitement. Concern is fear, and excitement is a form of greed. People hope that AI will help them do more with less time and effort invested, a greed for precious resources. However, investing in AI requires time, effort, and money to learn the right tools and how to use them. Playing around with AI is one thing, but seriously using it professionally or personally is a bigger step that will be affected by the greed vs fear pendulum. According to Pew Research Center, for the first time, the majority of Americans are concerned about AI. This increase in concern happens just as research is starting to demonstrate that AI is making people more productive, which should have fueled excitement. Ipsos reports that two-thirds of people think AI will profoundly change their daily life in 3-5 years, and almost half say it already has. What are your thoughts on the fear vs greed of AI adoption? Share your opinions in the comments. #AI #fear_greed #investment #genAI

3

2 Comments

Great to see another Seattle success story. Acquire featured in Ben Cohen's WSJ column. "A single episode requires hundreds of hours of research, which is why they release only 12 a year. In fact, the podcast is so unconventional that Gilbert and Rosenthal don’t even think of it as a podcast. They describe their shows as “conversational audiobooks.” One listener described them to me as “business porn.” It’s a wonky podcast about business history and strategy with four-hour episodes that drop once a month. And people from Silicon Valley to Wall Street are completely obsessed with it.   Gilbert and Rosenthal have become known for their comprehensive analysis, clear storytelling and overall craftsmanship. They focus on quality. They embrace scarcity. They want to do less, better. The hosts refer to Acquired as “the Hermès of podcasts,” which is a valuable brand to have. They now charge between $400,000 and $600,000 for four-episode sponsorships. (The current presenting sponsor is a unit of JPMorgan Chase.) It costs $40,000 a month just to advertise on the podcast’s archives, since the back catalog generates one-third of the show’s downloads. [link to full story below]

There's a new breed of CEO in town. The AI-Native CEO. These people are either rebuilding archaic companies or building in "adjacent possibilities," they're creating truly durable businesses with real customer value, and importantly, they're building their companies in an AI-native way; more efficient than ever, stitching together technologies that once required high-overhead, and focusing their hiring on people who are autodidacts, the ones who are inhaling knowledge on how to improve their own functions leveraging the newest tooling for the future of their jobs. A few of my favorite examples... Valley, backed by General Catalyst, getting 30-50% response rates for salespeople using conversational selling instead of archaic and annoying drip campaigns. AminoChain, backed by a16z, turning biobanks into to shoppable specimen centers so that healthcare institutions and researchers can purchase biomaterial like blood an stem cells and so donors can earn and track their participation in science. HIFI, backed by Blockchain Founders Fund, using stablecoin for B2B payments, creating instant settlement times and eliminating fee extortion. Dune Security, backed by Craft, using AI to test, identify, and train employees on their own risky actions, automatically reducing the biggest risk any business has--the behavior of its own employees. https://lnkd.in/eJUnuM4z #venturecapital #ai #artificialintelligence Antler

68

1 Comment

Great research brief coming out of UCLA Anderson School of Management. Why do startups make international moves? Simple finding in connection with funding 👉🏼 those chasing money abroad tend to raise a lot more of it. Are you raising money or expanding internationally? #startups #funding #internationalexpansion

3

If you are a woman founder and have feedback on the early-stage and angel fundraising process - read below and provide your insights and feedback as we build FBomb Angels.

25

INTJ Fund approaches community building with a very different perspective than other organizations. Learn how a community focused on INTJ and ENTJ women leads to collective exponential value. What? INTJ Fund is building a community that seeks to maximize mental health, intellectual curiosity, fun and finances of community members while minimizing downside volatility. This is our definition of a valuable community. Not just financial returns. Who? The core of my community is INTJ + ENTJ and/or Enneagram 3 women with an interest in business, psychology and emerging technology that are interested in continuous growth. This is the core of the community. Everything we do will cater to them. If you don't like these types of people, this isn't the community for you. Why? Most folks in venture view community as a power law identification strategy focused on identifying a fund returner. If this fails, the community dies with it. INTJ Fund is concurrently pursuing a community exponential growth strategy focused on consistent, compounding and cascading value as it relates to mental health, intellectual curiosity, fun and finances. This is the part that is unique. Infinite scaling with no end. If this is aligned with you path, contact me at kenneth@intj.fund with more information about who you are and what you are interested in. Happy to bet on: - Return to work place moms - Early career professionals - People in career transitions / layoffs I take a very long-term approach to the right people - read the article below to learn how I think and who I prioritize. https://lnkd.in/gGqx56xD #emergingtechnology #deeptech #venturecapital #intj #intjwomen #entj #entjwomen #intjfund

13

💪💡Wisdom is learning from past mistakes from others but also oneself. Retrospection with action is powerful. An insightful weekend read from the WSJ… Christopher Mims shares his list, from 10 years of covering consumer tech for the The Wall Street Journal: ( link here: https://lnkd.in/eKj2wX_t ) 1. Disruption is overrated. 2. Human factors are everything in tech adoption. 3. People lie to themselves… and to you. 4. Tech bubbles are productive, even if wasteful. 5. We’ve got more power to shape how tech impacts us. Some of my list, from 25 years of early stage consumer internet investing and operating: 1. Tech disruption is overestimated in the short run, underestimated in the long run. (Amara’s Law) 2. Social proof is powerful in tech adoption. 3. Hope kills. Execution is everything. 4. Run towards tech bubbles. 5. Tech optimism empowers positive change.

2

Navigating the VC landscape in San Diego? Discover firms that not only invest but also mentor and guide startups to success. Here's a snapshot: - Salesforce Ventures - Specializing in enterprise software. Founded by Halsey Minor, Marc Benioff, & Parker Harris. 🌐 - Versant Ventures - A beacon for biotech, founded by Barbara Lubash & co. 🧬 Healthcare & Biotech focus. 📈 - QED Investors - Fintech frontrunners, by Caribou Honig, Frank Rotman, & Nigel Morris. 💳 - HERCULES TECHNOLOGY GROWTH Capital - Supports startups to growth-stage companies across sectors. Founded by Manuel A. Henriquez & team. 📈 - Correlation Ventures - Co-investing champions in the US, initiated by Trevor Kienzle & David Coats. 🔍 - JMI Equity - Growth-stage software investment specialists. Established by Charles Noell & Harry Gruner. 💻 - Anzu Partners - Life science, manufacturing, and materials innovators, started by Michael David & co. 🔬 - Saltagen Ventures - Early-stage biotech focus, founded by Joseph F.. 🌏 NA and Asia. 📈 🌟 Whether you're seeking capital, mentorship, or operational expertise, these VC firms offer diverse opportunities for startups in various stages and industries. Full article here: https://lnkd.in/gpgkRHU3 👉 Looking to raise funding? Explore more about these firms and find your perfect match. #VCs #Startups #SanDiego #Innovation #Tech #SoCal

4

2 Comments

Navigating the VC landscape in San Diego? Discover firms that not only invest but also mentor and guide startups to success. Here's a snapshot: - Salesforce Ventures - Specializing in enterprise software. Founded by Halsey Minor, Marc Benioff, & Parker Harris. 🌐 - Versant Ventures - A beacon for biotech, founded by Barbara Lubash & co. 🧬 Healthcare & Biotech focus. 📈 - QED Investors - Fintech frontrunners, by Caribou Honig, Frank Rotman, & Nigel Morris. 💳 - HERCULES TECHNOLOGY GROWTH Capital - Supports startups to growth-stage companies across sectors. Founded by Manuel A. Henriquez & team. 📈 - Correlation Ventures - Co-investing champions in the US, initiated by Trevor Kienzle & David Coats. 🔍 - JMI Equity - Growth-stage software investment specialists. Established by Charles Noell & Harry Gruner. 💻 - Anzu Partners - Life science, manufacturing, and materials innovators, started by Michael David & co. 🔬 - Saltagen Ventures - Early-stage biotech focus, founded by Joseph F.. 🌏 NA and Asia. 📈 🌟 Whether you're seeking capital, mentorship, or operational expertise, these VC firms offer diverse opportunities for startups in various stages and industries. Full article here: https://lnkd.in/gpgkRHU3 👉 Looking to raise funding? Explore more about these firms and find your perfect match. #VCs #Startups #SanDiego #Innovation #Tech #SoCal

3

1 Comment

I am honored to host Nolan Bushnell for a fireside chat at TechCon SoCal 2024 in San Diego on May 24th. We'll discuss how his innovations at Atari laid the groundwork for today's tech landscape and what lessons we can draw for the future. 🌟 Why Nolan Bushnell is a Must-Hear for Every Tech Enthusiast🌟 🕹️ Pioneering the Video Game Industry: Bushnell's creation of Atari and the iconic game Pong marked the beginning of the video game era, democratizing technology through entertainment. By democratizing technology through entertainment, Bushnell made electronics and computing accessible, inspiring a generation and catalyzing the tech ecosystem. 👔 Redefining Startup Culture: Bushnell invented a new breed of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs: visionary, bold, and nonconformist. His management style and the work environment he fostered at Atari—including laid-back elements like beer and ping pong—helped set a template for Silicon Valley's informal and innovative corporate culture, influencing giants like Google and Facebook. 🌱 Innovating Venture Capital: Bushnell became a crucial pivot in VC history by becoming the first example of how new business models over technology advancement become VC "fundable". Sequoia Capital's first seed investment concept in Atari demonstrated the profitability of supporting early-stage consumer tech businesses. It broadened VC horizons to include software and entertainment, impacting how venture capital operates today. 🚀 Driving Silicon Valley's Evolution: The Foundation of Silicon Valley was Arthur Rock funding Fairchild Semiconductor & Intel, establishing the semiconductor industry, and putting the silicon in Silicon Valley. The expansion phase was Don Valentine's investment in Atari, expanding the focus from hardware to software and entertainment, creating the video game industry, and expanding Silicon Valley's tech ecosystem. Bushnell's role enabled the Transformation Phase of Silicon with the 1980 IPOs of Apple and Genentech, showcasing SV's innovation breadth across multiple sectors. 🔗 Enabling Icons: Bushnell provided Steve Jobs, who did not have a college degree, with his first job inspiration for the idea of bringing computers to home users, invaluable introductions and opportunities, and influenced the birth of Apple. 🎮 Inspiring Future Innovators: By integrating fun into computer use, Bushnell likely accelerated technological innovation by making computing appealing to those who might not have otherwise engaged with it. His work at Atari made the daunting world of computers relatable and exciting, inspiring many future founders and technologists. Nolan's influence is evident in the increased computer literacy and the surge in tech-driven career interests among the youth of his time. Connect with over 80 early-stage investors and hundreds of founders from San Diego, the Bay Area, Austin, Denver, and New York. Explore more about the event at https://lnkd.in/gTYMN65n

46

15 Comments

WHAT IT WILL TAKE TO WIN An apt comparison for the current AI landscape is the primordial soup of late 90s e-commerce. Though tempting, it’s important not to crown AI winners too early. It will take several years (likely a decade) to determine the winners in each category. The stakes are high: the winner-takes-most nature of these spaces makes it so that the #1 player is valued at 10-100x the #2 player. And the prize for being the #3 player is likely death and irrelevance. What will it take to win a category? In addition to product and distribution excellence, which are table stakes, two things will determine the winners: 1. Multiple (4-5) major compounding innovations over a sustained time horizon (5-10 years). 2. Dozens (if not hundreds) of “minor” but critical platform-level innovations which enable both the major innovations as well as collectively improve the customer experience in subtle but powerful ways. In e-commerce, it took Amazon a decade-plus from its founding to firmly establish itself as the leader in US e-commerce, despite early and strong competition. (And it still is not the leader in most countries around the world). I count at least 5 major innovations:, along with countless improvements to the underlying technology and infrastructure, including selection, inventory management, logistics, fulfillment and customer service. V1 Books (1994) - Amazon launched as an online bookstore. V2 Ratings and Reviews (1996) - we underestimate how profound this was to increase trust in online commerce. V3 One-click checkout (1997) - the impact of this on loyalty and conversion was overshadowed by the fact that Amazon had filed a patent around this innovation. V4 Marketplace and third party sellers (2000) - massive selection and margin improvements, truly making it the Everything Store. it happened gradually, then suddenly. V5 Amazon prime (2005) - this was the hammer. Even at the five year mark (1999), Amazon’s viability was questioned (remember Amazon.bomb?) Only at the 11 year mark did we start recognizing them as the likely winner. In hindsight, one can now connect the dots between the launches and see how each innovation was enabled by all the ones that came before. tldr CEOs: If your company launches one innovative product and you think you’re “good”, you’re likely. not going to win the category. Be ready to have the resilience, stamina and capital to run a marathon comprised of 5+ sprints, each over 1-2 years, before you can even think about winning your category.

455

8 Comments