Why Every Satellite Needs Earth | Northwood CEO on a16z Image

Why Every Satellite Needs Earth | Northwood CEO on a16z

23 March - 40 mins
Podcast Series The a16z Show

Bridgit Mendler, Co-founder and CEO of Northwood, joins a16z’s Erik Torenberg to discuss the critical but overlooked bottleneck in space: ground infrastructure. Northwood is building the systems that connect satellites back to Earth, enabling faster, more scalable space missions.

They cover Bridgit’s unconventional path to founding a space company, why vertical integration matters in hard tech, and how modern ground networks could unlock the next wave of innovation in the space economy, from national security to new commercial applications.

 

Resources:

Follow Bridgit on X: https://x.com/bridgitmendler

 

Stay Updated:

Find a16z on YouTube: YouTube

Find a16z on X

Find a16z on LinkedI...

40 mins

Series Episodes

Inside Palantir: Building Software That Matters with Shyam Sankar

Inside Palantir: Building Software That Matters with Shyam Sankar

In this conversation, Shyam Sankar, chief technology officer at Palantir Technologies, discusses his new book Mobilize, his commission in the U.S. Army, and why he believes the most important thing America can do right now is inspire its latent heretics to step forward. He also breaks down how he thinks about the SaaS market under AI pressure, what the "alpha versus beta software" distinction means for which companies survive, and why he started a film production company.

54 mins

20 March Finished

AI Just Gave You Superpowers — Now What?

AI Just Gave You Superpowers — Now What?

A new paper, “Some Simple Economics of AGI,” is making the rounds—Web3 with a16z we sat down with author Christian Catalini (MIT Crypto Economics Lab) and Eddy Lazzarin (CTO of a16z crypto), in conversation with Robert Hackett, to unpack what AGI could mean for work and markets.

1 hour 6 mins

19 March Finished

AI, Supply Chains, and the Future of Economic Power

AI, Supply Chains, and the Future of Economic Power

Erik Torenberg sits down with Jacob Helberg to discuss AI, manufacturing, supply chains, and the new geopolitics of technology. Drawing on themes from Helberg’s book The Wires of War, they explore why hardware, industrial capacity, and secure supply chains have become central to both economic strength and national security. They also unpack what it means to “win the AI race” — from model leadership and global adoption to energy, compute, tariffs, and reindustrialization in the U.S.

37 mins

18 March Finished

What's Missing Between LLMs and AGI - Vishal Misra & Martin Casado

What's Missing Between LLMs and AGI - Vishal Misra & Martin Casado

Vishal Misra returns to explain his latest research on how LLMs actually work under the hood. He walks through experiments showing that transformers update their predictions in a precise, mathematically predictable way as they process new information, explains why this still doesn't mean they're conscious, and describes what's actually required for AGI: the ability to keep learning after training and the move from pattern matching to understanding cause and effect.

47 mins

17 March Finished

AI Startups vs. Big Chatbots — With Olivia Moore

AI Startups vs. Big Chatbots — With Olivia Moore

In this episode, originally aired on Big Technology Podcast, Olivia Moore discusses whether AI startups can compete with the big chatbots, why American sentiment toward AI is so negative, and what she learned from giving LLMs personality tests. She also breaks down where ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini are diverging, why Open Claw signals a new wave of agentic products, and what makes memory the most underrated feature in consumer AI.

56 mins

16 March Finished

Recommended

Show name

Title

Sub title

Now Playing

The Pat Kenny Show

Live Now: 9AM - 12PM

Presenter logo
Brand

9AM

12AM

Now Playing

The Pat Kenny Show

The Pat Kenny Show

Of The Ball

1 hour left

Today Finished


Next Up

Default

Default

default

0 mins

No Account

Subscriptions to podcast series are only available to users with an account. Sign in or register to subscribe and access your subscriptions.

Register Sign in

Woops!

Error text.