No Priors: Artificial Intelligence | Technology | Startups
No Priors: Artificial Intelligence | Technology | Startups

No Priors: Artificial Intelligence | Technology | Startups

Conviction

Overview
Episodes

Details

At this moment of inflection in technology, co-hosts Elad Gil and Sarah Guo talk to the world's leading AI engineers, researchers and founders about the biggest questions: How far away is AGI? What markets are at risk for disruption? How will commerce, culture, and society change? What’s happening in state-of-the-art in research? “No Priors” is your guide to the AI revolution. Email feedback to [email protected]. Sarah Guo is a startup investor and the founder of Conviction, an investment firm purpose-built to serve intelligent software, or "Software 3.0" companies. She spent nearly a decade incubating and investing at venture firm Greylock Partners. Elad Gil is a serial entrepreneur and a startup investor. He was co-founder of Color Health, Mixer Labs (which was acquired by Twitter). He has invested in over 40 companies now worth $1B or more each, and is also author of the High Growth Handbook.

Recent Episodes

 From Coder to Manager: Navigating the Shift to Agentic Engineering with Notion Co-Founder Simon Last
MAR 12, 2026
From Coder to Manager: Navigating the Shift to Agentic Engineering with Notion Co-Founder Simon Last
Notion isn’t designing AI agents that just use tools. Their agents can autonomously build their own integrations, as well as write the code needed to finish a task. Sarah Guo sits down with Notion Co-Founder Simon Last to explore Notion’s rapid evolution from a simple writing assistant to a sophisticated platform for custom AI agents. Simon discusses the technical hurdles of indexing disparate data from sources like Slack and Google Drive, as well as the internal shift toward using coding agents to build Notion itself. Plus, Simon elaborates on what he sees as a fundamental transition in productivity: moving from a tool where humans do the work, to one where humans manage a swarm of agents. Sign up for new podcasts every week. Email feedback to [email protected] Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil | @simonlast | @NotionHQ Chapters: 00:00 – Cold Open 00:05 – Simon Last Introduction 00:26 – Genesis of Notion AI 04:10 – Challenge of Semantic Indexing and Retrieval 07:16 – The Six-Month Rewrite Cycle 08:12 – Notion’s Coding Agent Era 09:44 – Impact on Team Dynamics 12:49 – Launching Custom Agents 15:39 – Notion as the ‘Switzerland’ for Models 17:33 – Designing APIs for Agent Customers 20:09 – Simon’s Personal Agentic Workflows 24:48 – Notion: Tool for Work is Now A Tool for Agents 27:28 – How Building Has Changed for Simon 29:00 – Conclusion
play-circle icon
29 MIN
How Capital is Powering the AI Infrastructure Buildout with Magnetar Capital Managing Director Neil Tiwari
FEB 26, 2026
How Capital is Powering the AI Infrastructure Buildout with Magnetar Capital Managing Director Neil Tiwari
By the end of 2026, AI capital expenditure is projected to hit nearly $700 billion. The question isn’t who has the best model, but who has the most creative financing to build out AI infrastructure and beyond. Sarah Guo is joined by Neil Tiwari, Managing Director at Magnetar Capital, a financial innovator helping the AI industry scale from billions to trillions of dollars in CapEx. Neil explains some of the debt structures used to finance massive GPU clusters, who is taking the risk, and how the industry is maturing. Sarah and Neil also discuss how power distribution, energy storage, and physical materials like steel are the bottlenecks of the AI industry. Plus, Neil gives his take on the future of inference-optimized clouds, and why the market shift away from software and into infrastructure might be an overreaction. Sign up for new podcasts every week. Email feedback to [email protected] Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil  Chapters: 00:00 – Cold Open 00:05 – Neil Tiwari Introduction 00:26 – Magnetar’s Story 01:28 – Why CoreWeave Helped Magnetar Win 06:15 – Scaling CapEx Efficiently 09:02 – Debunking GPU Collateral Risk 11:42 – How Deal Structures Evolve 13:01 – What Bottlenecks Buildout 15:28 – Circular Financing Critiques 17:35 – The Shift from Training to Inference Workloads 23:10 – AI Factories 24:12 – Constraints of the Current Power Grid 28:27 – Sovereign Compute Buildouts 29:54 – Physical AI Capital Needs 32:48 – The Capital Rotation Away from SaaS 36:04 – Conclusion
play-circle icon
36 MIN
From SaaS to AI-First: How Companies Are Reshaping Innovation
FEB 19, 2026
From SaaS to AI-First: How Companies Are Reshaping Innovation
In this episode of No Priors, Sarah and Elad dive into the evolving landscape of software, exploring how AI is transforming the traditional SaaS model. They discuss whether SaaS as we know it is coming to an end, what new business and sales strategies are emerging, and how AI is reshaping the way software is built, sold, and scaled. The conversation also examines whether or not these shifts are a good thing for both big and small companies, and how coders and software experts are reacting to abrupt AI transitions. They also dig into how AI is reshaping sales, automating workflows, and enabling more predictive customer strategies. Beyond individual companies, they examine how tech giants are increasingly dominating the S&P 500, and what this concentration of power means for the future of startups, innovation, and the broader entrepreneurial ecosystem. Sign up for new podcasts every week. Email feedback to [email protected] Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil |  Chapters: 00:00 – Cold Open 00:35 – The SaaS-polcalypse discussion  4:55 – AI Change Management in Large vs. Small Companies 05:43 – “Is Software Eating the World?”  08:38 – Addressing the Unsolved Problems  14:00 – The Noise of the Last Month vs. Excitement  21:32  – What Proportion of GDP is Tech?  23:20 – Market Cap Shifts 25:02 – As a Company, When Should You Sell?  29:05 – Multi-Product Bundle Defense  30:45 – Conclusion
play-circle icon
40 MIN
Rivian’s Roadmap to AI Architecture and Autonomy with Founder and CEO RJ Scaringe
FEB 12, 2026
Rivian’s Roadmap to AI Architecture and Autonomy with Founder and CEO RJ Scaringe
Autonomous vehicle technology has moved past human-coded rules and into an era of neural networks and custom computer chips. And to solve the most difficult driving scenarios, electric vehicle company Rivian abandoned its original technology platform to build a vertically integrated data stack. Sarah Guo sits down with Rivian Founder and CEO RJ Scaringe to explore the seismic shift in the automotive industry toward AI-driven, software-defined vehicles . RJ discusses the move away from function or domain-based architecture for vehicle electronic systems to software-defined architecture, which allows for dynamic, monthly updates to features in Rivian’s vehicles. RJ also talks about the upcoming launch of Rivian’s R2 model, which aims to be a distinct, affordable, mass-market alternative to the Tesla Model Y. Plus, RJ shares his vision for a future where vehicles don’t just drive us, but inspire personal freedom and exploration. Sign up for new podcasts every week. Email feedback to [email protected] Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil | @RJScaringe | @Rivian  Chapters: 00:00 – Cold Open00:35 – RJ Scaringe Introduction0:58 – Rivian’s Autonomy Evolution05:19 – Why Rivian’s Tech is Vertically Integrated10:06 – Levels of Autonomous Driving Technologies14:00 – Importance of a Software-Defined Architecture19:28 – Differentiating Autonomous Vehicle Models23:20 – R2: The First Mass Market Autonomous Vehicle25:02 – Do Americans Want EVs?29:05 – How Our Relationship to Vehicles is Evolving30:45 – Conclusion
play-circle icon
31 MIN
 Introducing 4D Creation Open Beta: NPCs, 4D Worlds, and the Future of Gaming with Roblox CEO Dave Baszucki
FEB 5, 2026
Introducing 4D Creation Open Beta: NPCs, 4D Worlds, and the Future of Gaming with Roblox CEO Dave Baszucki
From “virtual doppelgängers” to “real-time dreaming,” online gaming platform Roblox is using AI technology to build the “Holodeck” envisioned in science fiction decades ago. Sarah Guo and Elad Gil sit down with Roblox CEO Dave Baszucki at Roblox headquarters to explore the intersection of AI, physics simulation, and the future of human connection. Dave discusses the evolution of the 4D creation tool in Roblox, a high-fidelity simulation that enables thousands of people to interact in real-time with photo-realistic graphics and acoustic physics. Dave reveals how Roblox is leveraging 13 billion hours of monthly user data to train native AI models that go beyond simple LLMs, enabling NPCs that can navigate and play games with human-like intuition. He also talks about how immersive communication will change video conferencing, how Roblox searches for unlikely talent outside of traditional elite universities, and how he balances rapid weekly iterations with keeping a “long view” on Roblox’s vision.  Sign up for new podcasts every week. Email feedback to [email protected] Follow us on Twitter: @NoPriorsPod | @Saranormous | @EladGil | @DavidBaszucki | @Roblox  Chapters: 00:00 – Cold Open 00:36 – Dave Baszucki Introduction 01:16 – Realizing Robolox’s 20-Year Vision 05:29 – Using 4D Immersive Simulations in Virtual Interactions 08:22 – Physics Engine vs. Photorealism  11:50 – Storing Roblox History as Vector Data 14:00 – Training NPCs - Moving Beyond LLMs 18:05 – The Future of the Game Designer 19:54 – Video Latent World Models 23:53 – Social Simulation - AI Companions and Virtual Relationships 27:26 – Why Asset Costs Haven’t Changed the Gaming Industry 29:52 – AI Coding in Roblox Studio 31:36 – The Roblox Creator Economy 33:57 – Long-Term Conviction vs. Weekly Iteration 37:50 – Dave’s Hiring Philosophy for Roblox 43:44 – Conclusion
play-circle icon
43 MIN