Karan Goel

Whoa…… from $22B to zero. And before this, in February, once the world’s most valuable Edtech startup was valued at $250m post money. Chilling. Any thoughts on why this is happening and insights for founders, Edtech and beyond? #startup #fundraising #valuation #chasingthebubble #fundamentals

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Nice to have 'Top New Release' status on Amazon for the latest book (my 25th) that explores an alternative paradigm for quantum computation. Illustrations (111) by Dr. Narendra Madhav Joshi. My take is that we owe it to ourselves at this early stage of the industry's lifecycle to explore alternative approaches. Here is a brief overview: "This book attempts to reveal something of the vastly different and fundamentally creative quality of computing that must accompany any computation involving the quantum-levels. To linearly project digital computing laurels manifest as increasing speeds and the ability to process vaster amounts of information, as the inevitable trajectory of quantum computing is perhaps, in the aphorism attributed to the Buddha, to look only at the finger and to miss the moon and the sky that it is pointing to. The cover figure highlights all that is being missed, summarized as an egg-like structure synonymous with the term ‘Hiranyagarbha’ in Sanskrit. This depicts the womb of creation abundant with many layers and patterns reflecting luminescence, due to the constant superposition and entanglement inherent to the quantum computation that derives from a light-centered interpretation of quantum dynamics." The book is available here: https://lnkd.in/gXu4H9uW #quantumcomputation #quantumtech #technologyleadership #cosmology #systemsthinking

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Why IIT undergrads do well in tech? It’s a written exam focused on math, physics, chemistry. That's it. No interviews, no subjective evaluation of resumes, no influence of whether your parents studied at IIT or not. It's very competitive so people who clear it are effectively demonstrating the combo of work ethic + passion to do well + IQ level in the cleanest possible way. Equally, since there’s no such thing as legacy admissions, the IIT entrance exam is the great leveler for anyone growing up in India. Do well in the written exam and you have a chance to change your life.

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Founder Dadagiri: The challenge with Founders who "just can't let go". I keep sharing Microsoft's incredible story. I saw Steve Ballmer and met Satya Nadella, and they were as different as Neebu ka achaar and Boondi ka Ladoos. (Ballmer was Achaar). But they (Ballmer and Gates) let Nadella do his thing; boy, what he did was magical! Enter Howard Schultz, the founder and genius of Starbucks. Via WSJ “Howard Schultz, the legendary entrepreneur who turned a local coffee chain into a global icon, was meeting Laxman Narasimhan, the man who would succeed him as Starbucks CEO in a month. Shultz had recently watched a New York Giants practice and was inspired by how football teams manage their time and structure their work by unit—offence, defence, and special teams. He told Laxman that the same principle could be applied to Starbucks’s systems, which Schultz had spent nearly a year analysing in search of ways to improve service. Narasimhan wasn’t buying it. “That’s a football team. We are a company,” he said. “If you don’t like it, that's fine; it’s your company,” Schultz said, laughing, as Narasimhan chuckled.” It seems that the spirit is not working. "It all exploded into public view Sunday night when Schultz wrote a LinkedIn post that read like an open letter to shareholders criticizing how Narasimhan and his senior leaders were running the business" See link - https://lnkd.in/dx3ebFgP I read the post, and these statements sounded terrible. See #Dhandhekibaat (DKB) comments inserted in the flow "There is a natural tendency to try to do too much too soon. " "Don’t try to do everything at once." "Leaders must model both humility and confidence as they work to restore trust and increase performance across the organization." DKB - It sounds like he is preaching to some B'School kids. The Humility and Confidence point sounds horrible "Over the past five days, I have been asked by people inside and outside the company for my thoughts on what should be done. The stores require a maniacal focus on the customer experience through the eyes of a merchant. The answer does not lie in data but in the stores." DKB - therein lies the bullying. WHY answer these questions and give side views? Instead, say, "I am sure Laxman and the team are on top of it" (And send your gyaan privately to Lax). Learning: As a founder, it's impossible to let go. Only the rarest manage to achieve Microsoft's magic. As they say, "Love means never having to say sorry". #Dhandhekibaat "Letting go means never having to say ANYTHING" :) Do you agree? Article Link in comments

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🚀 Day 18 of My 25-Day Generative AI and LLM Challenge 🤖🚀 🌟 How Variational Autoencoders (VAEs) Work: Encoding & Decoding 🌟with my friends HARSH JAVIA and Maanan Jagani! Variational Autoencoders (VAEs) are a type of generative model that aim to learn the underlying structure of data. Here's a simplified breakdown of how they work, using a bit of professional flair and emojis to keep it engaging! 🔍 1. Understanding the Basics🔍 At a high level, VAEs consist of two main components: 1. Encoder 🧠: - Takes input data (e.g., images, text) and compresses it into a lower-dimensional space known as the **latent space**. - Think of this as summarizing the essence of the input data into a compact representation. 2. Decoder 💡: - Takes the encoded representation from the latent space and tries to reconstruct the original input data. - This process helps the model learn to generate new data that is similar to the input data. 🚀 2. Step-by-Step Process 🚀 Step 1: Encoding 📥 - The encoder network receives the input data and transforms it into a mean (μ) and a standard deviation (σ). - From these, a latent vector \( z \) is sampled using the reparameterization trick: \( z = \mu + \sigma \cdot \epsilon \), where \( \epsilon \) is a random variable from a standard normal distribution. Step 2: Latent Space 🌌 - The latent space is a lower-dimensional representation that captures the essential features of the input data. - This space allows the model to explore various possible data representations. Step 3: Decoding 📤 - The decoder network takes the latent vector \( z \) and attempts to reconstruct the original input data. - The quality of the reconstruction indicates how well the model has learned the data's underlying structure. 🌟 3. Why VAEs are Powerful🌟 - Data Generation 🎨: VAEs can generate new, unseen data that is similar to the training data, useful in creative applications like art and music. - Dimensionality Reduction 📉: They reduce the complexity of data, making it easier to visualize and analyze. - Anomaly Detection 🔍: VAEs can identify anomalies by recognizing data that doesn’t fit the learned patterns. 🏆 4. Professional Takeaway 🏆 Variational Autoencoders are a powerful tool in the machine learning toolbox, enabling efficient data compression, reconstruction, and generation. Their ability to model complex data distributions makes them invaluable for various applications, from image generation to anomaly detection. #MachineLearning #AI #DataScience #DeepLearning #GenerativeModels #VariationalAutoencoders #VAEs #NeuralNetworks #DataInnovation #TechTrends #ArtificialIntelligence #MLApplications #DataGeneration #TechInspiration #Innovation #AIResearch #DataAnalytics #DeepLearningModels #TechCommunity

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Given the changing paradigms in technology and media, we know that the next 10 years will look nothing like the last 10 years. Thanks to The Economic Times for capturing our interactive media thesis for the years ahead. As we crystal ball gaze into the future, there has been no better time to invest in India. In the last few years, we have seen the market mature across key vectors - propensity to pay, quality of talent, capital inflows, and exits. This represents meaningful upside for founders and investors in this space over the coming decade. With the incredible shifts in tech, media and gaming, there are some exciting times ahead! 🚀 https://lnkd.in/gTfYa3Kw

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I participated in a “SMART MANUFACTURING” panel with Gayathri Radhakrishnan, Rohini Chakravarthy and Abhijit Supekar (moderator) last week at TIECon 2024. The coolest part of the panel was 3 Women VCs talking about a topic that has not traditionally been discussed by women. I never imagined I’d see this in my lifetime. Things have indeed changed! We had a very lively discussion of whether we can expect lights out factory in 5-10 years. Automation is happening in all stages but full automation manufacturing is tough because it requires human like adaptability. It is not converting text into instruction or code - it is about precision. Robotics + AI is making this happen and we will get there. AI is going to bring the cost down for complete solution for example: there are robotic arms that can do more tasks and learn like a human and not just some specific tasks. Also check out our portfolio companies Micropsi Industries and RGo Robotics that are making it happen in this space. Thanks to Anshu Bahadur Hrishikesh Sathawane Nilesh Dixit for organizing the panel and Anita Manwani and Surbhi Kaul for making this happen! #TiECon2024 #AIUbiquity

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Recently, Perplexity has raised the round, which makes it a unicorn. The CEO and co-founder is Aravind Srinivas an IIT graduate settled in the USA and working on the future of search engines. Microsoft has invested $10 billion in OpenAI. While I'm not deeply versed in Software Engineering, as an entrepreneur and researcher, I understand that developers leverage copilot models, LLM models, and GPT to enhance their skills and productivity. Here's a thought-provoking question: As India moves towards fostering a robust startup ecosystem, why haven't we seen the emergence of startups or dedicated research companies like Perplexity OpenAI ? Shouldn't there be an initiative, driven either by emotion or patriotism, to establish a groundbreaking startup like OpenAI within India? What factors are hindering these developments in India? We seem to be predominantly utilizing their APIs and models without creating similar groundbreaking companies. Why haven't we seen an Indian company achieve a trillion-dollar valuation, especially in the IT sector? Why aren't Indian venture capitalists investing more in search and research companies? I might be off base, but this is what I've observed. I encourage everyone, to engage in an open discussion on this topic in the comments below. Let's debate and explore these questions together. #ai #jobs #unicorn #valuation #india #software #microsoft #google #banglore

We had a full house in a fireside chat with Arvind Jain, Glean's CEO and co-founder, at Stanford University Graduate School of Business! It was an honor to talk with him about building successful companies in the dynamic #AI era. He shared invaluable lessons from his remarkable journey: building Google search infra, founding Rubrik (which went public last month!), and founding Glean, recently nominated by Forbes as one of the Top 50 AI companies! 🎯 Start with the problem, not the solution Arvind is very bullish on Glean's mission to solve app fragmentation and workplace knowledge. He saw his customers at Rubrik struggle with it and took the time to validate it. People tend to undermine the importance of a problem and get too excited about the solution. However, if the solution solves the wrong problem, users will not adopt it. 🤝 Validate hypotheses with people you don't know Friends want to support and might avoid critical feedback. Arvind and the team spent the first year of Glean sending cold LinkedIn reach-outs to potential customers to validate the problem and the solution. While he could easily leverage his network, he wanted unbiased feedback from people who didn't know him. 🎧 When it's noisy outside - stay focused on your customers. That's your moat. With every week's announcements of AI innovations, Glean's Northstar is to be customer-driven and leverage new technologies where there's a fit. Even though they are busy with the growth struggles of a Series D company, Glean teams are working on 70 % of core work : 30% of experimental projects, to stay ahead of the curve. 📈 Companies should plan how to embrace AI internally As a 2nd-time founder, Arvind is looking for new opportunities to use AI at Glean and improve #productivity, beyond using Glean Assistant. With so much innovation, customers are very excited about AI demos but get disappointed when they try to use new tools for their specific use cases. It will take a (short) while before we see a significant impact on productivity.

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🚀 The need for India-focused GenAI platforms has led to a host of indigenous developments. Let's take a look at 8 Made-in-India LLMs that are shaping the country's future. 🔸 Recognizing the socio-cultural gap in existing systems, entrepreneurs and developers from India are working on a GenAI ecosystem tailored for Indian consumption, yielding better contextual outputs across all formats. 🔸 A handful of homegrown conglomerates, such as Reliance (Jio), Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, and Mahindra & Mahindra, are already working on a slew of GenAI projects. 🔸 Indigenous developments like BharatGPT, Ola Krutrim, and Project Indus (a Tech Mahindra venture including 40 different Indic languages), are addressing the language challenges pan-Indian users face in real life and now in the AI world. According to Inc42 data, India’s GenAI market is expected to grow exponentially in the next few years, surpassing $17 Bn by 2030 from $1.1 Bn in 2023, growing at a CAGR of 48%. With BharatGPT and its ilk taking charge and cementing their positions in India’s conversational AI landscape, India is well-prepared for a new era of digital empowerment where language barriers are dissolved and access to information is democratized. 🌟 Thoughts on this trend: Cultural and Linguistic Relevance: These platforms address India's diverse socio-cultural and linguistic nuances, ensuring inclusivity and effectiveness. Local Innovations and Entrepreneurship: Investments by companies like Reliance, TCS, Infosys, and Mahindra & Mahindra highlight India's growing tech ecosystem and global AI positioning. Economic Growth and Opportunities: The rapid expansion of the GenAI market signifies substantial economic opportunities, leading to job creation and skill development. Digital Empowerment and Accessibility: By providing AI-driven solutions in multiple Indian languages, these platforms enhance digital literacy and inclusivity. Addressing Real-World Challenges: Indigenous AI platforms deliver solutions closely aligned with the needs and preferences of the local population, improving customer service, education, and healthcare support. The emergence of India-focused GenAI platforms is a promising development driving technological, economic, and social progress in the country. Let's look forward to a digitally empowered and inclusive future! 🚀🌐 #GenAI #AI #India #DigitalTransformation #Innovation #Technology #BharatGPT #OlaKrutrim #ProjectIndus #DigitalEmpowerment #FutureTech #AIinIndia

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My sense is that NVIDIA's dominance in AI compute is likely to be disrupted 1st in inference (if and when it happens). Mark Zuckerberg made a very interesting point in his conversation with Dwarkesh Patel recently. He said - Meta's ratio of inference to training compute is much higher than most other companies leveraging AI. This is because Meta serves extremely large user communities across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, etc., resulting in huge volumes of inference requests. In contrast, companies focused mainly on research and development may have lower ratios of inference to training compute. The scale of Meta's user base means inference optimization is more important for them in order to efficiently serve real-time requests from billions of users. This was one factor in Meta's decision to develop custom silicon optimized for inference to reduce GPU consumption and free up more expensive GPU resources for training models. I suspect that all the large cos will reduce their dependencies on NVIDIA as they scale their AI inference compute. As of now, the four cos - Amazon Web Services (AWS), Meta, Google, and Microsoft - account for >1/3rd of NVIDIA’s data centre business, and all of them have their custom AI chip initiatives. I don't know what opportunities will be created for early-stage companies in this area, but I will be doing a deep dive here. Let me know who I should be speaking with for these initiatives.

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My 2nd post on start-ups I met at MIT's "Imagination in Action" conference on June 7th is about code generation and verification. This is a theme I have been exploring lately in my investigations of how we would supervise LLMs that check code generation by other LLMs. 1. coadapt.ai (https://codapt.ai/) lead by Trevor Keith caught my attention because it is working on code generation by focusing on building autonomous web apps. That is a great intersection between exploring autonomy in code generation and commercial applications. We talked about the problem of hallucinations and he described some clever ways he has for reducing them in his work. 2. Nectry co-founded by Adam Chlipala is doing two seemingly disparate things at the same time - allowing non programmers to build software that can be proven to be secure and compliant of its specification. This is done by using Adam's work on formal software verification where he has developed a "legalese" language that non programmers can understand but is, itself, amenable to formal verification. Adam also gave a talk during the conference and I'll share that link when it becomes available as it relates to my own work on the logic of unsupervised evaluation. Adam believes that formal methods may not be a hot topic today, just as Neural Networks once were, but that in the future it will play a greater role in the development of software and AI in general. I agree with that vision. Formal methods are starting to gain traction in ML and AI as seen in the work of Max Tegmark and Steve Omohundro, for example.

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Wondering what top research got published this last week? 📑🤖🤔 So essentially, 1. "AI Model StyleFeatureEditor gives highly detailed image editing results!" 2. "We have a Universal Quantum Chemistry dataset to find new drugs now!" 3. "Stylebreeder clusters diverse art styles from 6.8M images on Artbreeder, enhancing personalized AI-driven artistic expression." 4. "LongRAG addresses the limitations of traditional RAG by using long retrieval units" 5. "Language model tuned to avoid toxic language in English will also avoid it in other languages!" 6. "YOUDREAM Auto-Generates Perfect 3D Creatures from Text!" From cutting-edge research on Artificial Intelligence to advances in Machine Learning, Computer Vision, and Neuroscience, we distill the latest technical papers into bite-sized insights you can apply today! For more subscribe at https://lnkd.in/gJ_wJxAC

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I was invited yesterday by Ranaq Sen for his incredible podcast ‘The CuHRious Show’ where he gives an opportunity to new age founders to demonstrate their products and highlight the problems solved by them. I talk about my journey from banking to joining a tech start-up and then eventually starting one!! Do watch the podcast to understand how the #alumni engagement can be the next big thing for the #HR leadership to tackle. Use the power of alumni to: 1. Amplify your brand presence. 2. Improve your Glassdoor rankings. 3. Reduce your #hiring costs via job #referrals. 4. Provide great exit experience through ticket management and document sharing repositories. Finally, get the data insights such as “What percentage of alumni are working with what organizations” through our LinkedIn integration. Thanks Ranaq Sen for inviting me, loved our conversation 😊 Boomerangs.ai https://lnkd.in/gaWp7mbp

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While evaluating biases in multimodal LLMs on Hugging Face, I faced an interesting challenge. Current approaches to achieve fairness in AI models overgeneralise, potentially flattening the cultural nuances that exist across demographics and social groups. We must find ways to mitigate harmful biases in AI without sacrificing the diversity that makes us uniquely human. #ArtificialIntelligence #aibias #diversity

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Only TWO days left to apply for the RippleX Fellowship program! If you are a student/dropout/recent grad building a b2b software company in Canada/US, this is the program for you. In our last batch we had some amazing mentors like: - Braden Ream (CEO, Voiceflow): Mastering storytelling and navigating selling into enterprises - Rahul Parmar (Prev. Senior Director of Sales, Drata): Sales 101 – Converting pilots to real revenue, creating urgency among buyers, and best practices to manage a sales process - Nicholas Chepesiuk (CEO, OnCall Virtual Care, now part of Qualifacts): Striving towards product-market fit, utilizing creative outbound strategies, and the importance of building trust with customers in the early days - Justin Sky (CEO, Rose Rocket): Identifying venture-scale markets, learning when to pivot, and building strong organizational culture - Josh Gray (CEO, Artemis): Conducting customer validation, segmenting your ICP, and advice for young founders Apply here: https://lnkd.in/e2iAu6vi

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I try to keep polical commentary to a minimum on this platform, but am glad make an exception for a close friend. Vikram Mansharamani has been one of my best & closest friends for nearly a decade. I know him to be a good man, a dedicated husband & father, an independent thinker, & an American patriot. Vikram is running for Congress in New Hampshire’s 2nd district & needs all the support he can get. If you want to get to know Vikram & his ideas, read his books. - ‘Boombustology’ (https://a.co/d/erZe7R4) - ‘Think for Yourself’ (https://a.co/d/6wurn8g) - ‘The Making of a Generalist’ (https://a.co/d/4QvDAYI) Or read his articles on Substack or LinkedIn. But, today, I want to tell you about the Vikram I know. I want to explain why I trust Vikram’s instincts, & why I believe he genuinely wants to serve the country instead of simply chasing his own ambition. Vikram & I have always agreed that America is worth fighting for & needs to do more to safeguard its security, prosperity, & ideals as China & its new Axis of Autocrats seek to displace us on the world stage. While Vikram & I have run into some strong disagreements about the best ways to achieve those goals, Vikram has been a consistent voice of reason in my life & always encouraged me to think for myself. When I drifted to the “center left” in the late 2010s & during the pandemic (believing incorrectly, like a lot of Americans, that I was on the “right side of history”) Vikram warned me of the dangers of even well intentioned collectivism. When I naively believed that Joe Biden could help put America back on the right track like a modern day FDR or Abraham Lincoln, Vikram explained how & why the incoming administration would more likely bring the country to ruin. Vikram warned about the risks a serious pandemic could pose to America long before 2020. He warned me in real time about the risks posed by lockdowns, censorship, social engibeering, DEI, open borders, the subversion of the US Constitution, & the weaponization of the federal government. It didn’t take me long to realize that Vikram was right & that, on many of these topics, I had been wrong. Despite our disagreement in 2020, Vikram never gave up on me & patiently stuck by me as I found my way back to the North Star of individual liberty defended by *limited* government. Based on my own personal experience, I know Vikram can be a voice of reason in Congress & help America find its way back to the powerful ideas which once made it free, prosperous, & strong. I am proud to be Vikram’s friend. https://lnkd.in/guXEC_-q

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What if the answer to a massive healthcare problem was hidden in plain sight? In this week's The Lobster Talks, we follow Ankur Rustagi of Saatvy Health (YC S23) a YC founder who pivoted from AI to delve into the untapped potential of Ayurveda for chronic conditions. Ankur's curiosity was piqued by a startling statistic: the U.S. spends trillions on healthcare, yet a significant portion of the population suffers from chronic illnesses. Driven by personal experience and a thirst for solutions beyond conventional medicine, Ankur turned to Ayurveda. This episode uncovers: -The eye-opening data that revealed the scale of the chronic illness problem in the U.S. -Ankur's personal journey with rheumatoid arthritis and his exploration of alternative treatments -The discovery of Ayurveda's potential to manage symptoms and address root causes -The initial skepticism surrounding Ayurveda's ancient wisdom and its relevance in the modern world -Ankur's decision to dive deeper, connecting with practitioners, experimenting, and witnessing the benefits firsthand Listen to the full episode to hear Ankur's story and gain valuable insights into: -The power of questioning conventional wisdom and seeking alternative solutions -The importance of personal experiences in shaping entrepreneurial journeys -The potential of ancient healing traditions like Ayurveda to address modern health challenges -The courage to embrace unconventional ideas and explore uncharted territories 🎧 Listen to this episode on your fave pod platform or watch on YouTube -https://lnkd.in/e6_hUq_6 . . . . . #ayurveda #chronicillness #healthcaresolutions #founderstory #YCstartup #thelobstertalks

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Two AI Releases SUTRA: A Multilingual AI Model Improving Language Processing in Over 30 Languages for South Asian Markets SUTRA’s architecture comprises two mixture-of-experts transformers: a concept model and an encoder-decoder for translation. The concept model is trained to predict the next token, leveraging publicly available datasets primarily in languages with abundant data like English. Concurrently, the translation model learned from 100 million human- and machine-translated conversations across multiple languages, allowing it to map concepts to similar embeddings in all languages it supports. The innovative integration of these models involves the translation model’s encoder generating an initial embedding from the input text, which the concept model processes and feeds into the translation model’s decoder to produce the final output. This approach ensures that SUTRA can effectively handle a diverse range of languages, making it a robust tool for multilingual communication. SUTRA is available in three versions: Pro, Light, and Online. SUTRA-Pro and SUTRA-Online offer high performance and internet connectivity at $1 per 1 million tokens, while SUTRA-Light provides a low-latency option at $0.75 per 1 million tokens. This pricing structure makes SUTRA an attractive option for users and businesses in cost-sensitive markets. Read our take on this: https://lnkd.in/gSN-Rk85 Paper: https://lnkd.in/gpDbGDCe? Model: https://www.two.ai/sutra? Chatbot: https://chat.two.ai/ TWO.AI

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