This Week in Startups

→ WHAT IT COVERS Jason Calacanis and co-host examine three topics: AngelList's USVC fund offering venture exposure at $500 minimums to non-accredited investors, a special forces soldier charged for insider trading on Polymarket's Venezuela-Maduro prediction markets, and the New York Times normalizing theft and murder rhetoric on their opinions podcast. → KEY INSIGHTS - **USVC Fee Structure Trade-off:** AngelList's Naval Ravikant-backed fund charges a flat 2.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Jason Calacanis interviews Will Edwards of Firehawk Aerospace, a defense tech startup using 3D-printed solid rocket propellant to cut production costs by 50% and multiply U.S. output fivefold, plus a segment with ViewBuds creator Marucci Kim on AI-enabled camera earbuds for wearable visual intelligence. → KEY INSIGHTS - **Defense tech timing window:** Startups in defense have roughly 24 months to establish relevance before the U.S.

→ WHAT IT COVERS SpaceX and Cursor announce a partnership valued at $10B–$60B to build competitive AI coding models, while BitStarter launches a machine learning incubator track on BitTensor backed by cofounder Jacob Steeves, and Trajectory RL introduces subnet 11, a decentralized competition network for generating optimized AI agent skill files. → KEY INSIGHTS - **SpaceX-Cursor deal structure:** The partnership operates as a staged acquisition: SpaceX pays $10B for model collaboration now,...

→ WHAT IT COVERS Jason Calacanis and Lon Harris interview Josh Sirota, CEO of Aragon, on why enterprises should own custom AI models trained on proprietary data rather than relying on frontier models like Claude or GPT-4. They also cover drone logistics startup Iona, FAA Part 108 regulations, Kimi K2.6 launch, and Sergey Brin's internal Google memo on AI adoption.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Jason Ballard, founder of ICON, explains how 3D-printed concrete construction delivers homes for $99K–$120K, cuts military barracks build time from two years to six months at half the cost, and positions the same technology for lunar construction. A second segment covers Resi Labs' BitTensor-powered real estate appraisal model achieving 98% pricing accuracy.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Albert Brotherton (22) and Boris Radilov (24) present Nanogram, a TikTok-style feed of AI-generated mobile games, launched mid-January with 100,000 users. Separately, One X founder Bernd Øverås details Neo, a 66-pound home humanoid robot priced at $20,000, shipping to early adopters in 2026 with a world-model AI architecture. → KEY INSIGHTS - **Nanogram's engagement metrics:** Within six weeks of launch, Nanogram reached 100,000 users with 20% classified as power users who play...

→ WHAT IT COVERS Stillcore Capital Partner Mark Jeffrey joins This Week in Startups to break down the alleged $10M rug pull on Bittensor's Templar subnet by founder Sam Dare, who dumped 37,000 TAO tokens on subnet holders before departing. The episode also features three subnet founders from Bitmind and Macrocosmos explaining their deepfake detection and distributed AI training projects.

→ WHAT IT COVERS BitTensor's TAO token drops 15% after Covenant AI's Sam Dair allegedly sold subnet tokens and abandoned the project, accusing cofounder Jacob Steves of blocking operations. The episode also covers subnet 85's video upscaling technology, a Claude-based multi-persona advisory council tool, and the global permissionless workforce powering decentralized AI networks.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Anthropic's unreleased model Claude Mythos can autonomously chain multiple software vulnerabilities into sophisticated exploits, discovering more zero-day security flaws than human researchers find in careers. The episode covers the national security implications, Project Glasswing's defensive deployment with major tech partners, and the parallel rise of small language models as a cost-cutting alternative to frontier AI spending.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Three founders — Ryan Carson, Alex Finn, and Yazin Ali Rahim — demonstrate live AI agent deployments replacing traditional staff roles: a chief-of-staff agent (Claw Chief), an autonomous venture-launching swarm (HENRY), and a real-time multi-persona podcast producer (Side Cast), while debating Anthropic's decision to end third-party Claude subscription access.

→ WHAT IT COVERS FeltSense CEO Marek Hazan used AI agents to rebuild every Y Combinator W26 batch startup, revealing that 10–20% were immediately replicable and ~30% were too hardware-dependent to clone. The episode also covers Bordie, an AI networking principal with 150,000 contacts, and a $1.8B GLP-1 telehealth company built by two brothers for $20.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Three CEOs — Jeremy Frankel (Fundamental, $255M Series A unicorn), Victor Ripparbelli (Synthesia, $4B valuation, 100M+ ARR), and Nick Harris (Lightmatter) — discuss large tabular models, AI video evolution, and photonic interconnects reshaping how enterprises process data and run AI infrastructure at scale. → KEY INSIGHTS - **Large Tabular Models vs.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Jason Calacanis, Delian Asparouhov, Sal Chury, and Larsen Jensen cover Bloomberg's report of a confidential SpaceX IPO filing targeting a June 2026 listing at a $1.75 trillion valuation, AI's public trust crisis with 80% bipartisan skepticism, defense tech bubble risks, and domestic supply chain reindustrialization strategy. → KEY INSIGHTS - **SpaceX IPO wealth recycling:** When SpaceX lists at its $1.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Google AI product manager Shubham Saboo shares a five-step framework for building autonomous OpenClaw agent teams that operate continuously without human prompting. The episode also covers AgentMail as a Gmail alternative for agents, Molt World's distributed agent network concept, and X's Grok real-time translation feature connecting Japanese and American users.

→ WHAT IT COVERS This 99-minute episode of This Week in Startups features AstroForge CEO Matt Gialich detailing plans to mine platinum group metals from near-Earth asteroids using $10.4M spacecraft, Templar's Sam Dare explaining how his BitTensor subnet trained a 72-billion-parameter AI model for $2–3M through decentralized compute, and a demo of OpenNotes, an open-source real-time meeting intelligence tool.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Three BitTensor subnets — MetaNova (subnet 68), BitCast (subnet 93), and Score (subnet 44) — demonstrate how decentralized crypto-incentivized networks apply to drug discovery, YouTube creator monetization, and commercial computer vision respectively, with each subnet using miners and validators competing 24/7 to generate progressively more valuable AI outputs.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Jason Calacanis hosts Jake Ladder (Gecko Robotics CEO) and Chris Lattner (Modular CEO) to examine three converging forces: purpose-built industrial robots versus humanoid general-purpose machines, NVIDIA's chip dominance and emerging competitors including Google TPUs and Amazon Trainium, and the $2.5B NVIDIA chip smuggling case revealing AI as a national security battleground. → KEY INSIGHTS - **Purpose-built vs.

→ WHAT IT COVERS This episode examines the Delve compliance startup fraud allegations — 500 boilerplate SOC 2 reports with swapped logos, zero auditor findings across 259 clients — alongside a broader discussion of how AI is reshaping early-stage investing, startup governance failures, and the BitTensor/TAO decentralized compute ecosystem with subnet-based lead generation startup LeadPoet.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Zipline founder Keller Clifton traces the company's path from delivering blood in Rwanda in 2016 — when drone delivery was illegal in the US — to operating 130 million autonomous commercial miles across eight countries, saving 17,000 lives annually, and now scaling suburban US delivery at a $4 billion-plus valuation. Superhuman founder Rahul Vohra also covers his two acquisition journeys.

→ WHAT IT COVERS Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev joins Jason Calacanis at Launch Festival to trace Robinhood's path from a zero-revenue, millennial-focused trading app to a $68B company with 11 business lines each generating over $100M annually, covering growth mechanics, AI strategy, and product development discipline. → KEY INSIGHTS - **Zero-revenue launch strategy:** Robinhood eliminated the $10 trading commission entirely, keeping only the $1 payment-for-order-flow rebate.