SpaceX To A Trillion Billion Million

If you haven’t seen the SpaceX video by now, you should. Here.

The thing that’s really hard to take in from the photos and the video is the scale. That rocket is 20 stories tall. Picture a 20 story building. See it in your mind. Now picture it flying in the sky. Now picture it falling back to earth and being caught by a set of giant metal chopsticks.

There’s a bunch of interesting discussion / analysis out there that breaks down what Starship would mean for space travel that I’d encourage you to check out. Here’s the page from SpaceX that outlines it at a high level. Long-term this is a step towards Mars. In the shorter term, this is a big step for Starlink which seems to be moving in a really exciting direction that would have me sweating if I was broadband exec.

For context, here are the current market capitalizations of major broadband providers:

• Comcast: $159.78 billion

• AT&T: $153.23 billion

• Verizon: $184.27 billion

• Charter Communications: $46.58 billion

Away from Elon and SpaceX - Dario from Anthropic put out a great post about the future of AI, which he seems to be in a great position to comment on. If you care about AI, or the future generally, or likely both - it’s worth a read here: Machines of Loving Grace

Some of the things that stood out to me:

• He takes a not so subtle shot at Sam Altman: “I am often turned off by the way many AI risk public figures (not to mention AI company leaders) talk about the post-AGI world, as if it’s their mission to single-handedly bring it about like a prophet leading their people to salvation.”

• He does a great job outlining the areas he thinks are most primed for AI to benefit and then tackles them one-by-one:

  • Biology and physical health

  • Neuroscience and mental health

  • Economic development and poverty

  • Peace and governance

  • Work and meaning

• For someone devoting his life to AI he generally seems to be able to keep perspective in a way that he summarizes well at the end, but it’s felt throughout the essay: “Throughout writing this essay I noticed an interesting tension. In one sense the vision laid out here is extremely radical: it is not what almost anyone expects to happen in the next decade, and will likely strike many as an absurd fantasy. Some may not even consider it desirable; it embodies values and political choices that not everyone will agree with. But at the same time there is something blindingly obvious—something overdetermined—about it, as if many different attempts to envision a good world inevitably lead roughly here.”

Again - I’d encourage you to read it and I’m due to sit down to more fully pull together my thoughts on it. That along with some other ideas around “Venture 2.0” and “No Small Town Heroes: YC Wins Again” are on my list for longer posts so stay tuned!

Sandhill Exclusive Content 

This Wednesday: Pre-Seed Rounds in 2024

Join us live tomorrow as we'll be deep diving into the private markets and the latest venture news. You won’t want to miss this one!

• ​Soso Sazesh, Co-Founder @ 43. After founding a growth agency, Growth Pilots, and working with companies like Instacart, Zapier, and Gusto, he led a team at Wpromote following Growth Pilots' acquisition. Now, he spents his time as an early-stage investor. X - @sososazesh

• ​Amit Vasudev, Managing Partner @ Earl Grey Capital. Amit is a seasoned venture capital investor at Earl Grey Capital, who focuses on early-stage investments in innovative technology startups. Previously, Amit was also the co-founder of Clearbit. X - @amitvasudev_

​​This event is brought to by Sacra and Sandhill Markets

ICYMI: Enterprise Onboarding in 2024

In case you missed us last Wednesday, be sure to check out our recording as we discussed Enterprise Onboarding in 2024.

​​Our panelists were:

• ​​Markus Rentsch, CEO @ Remark-able. Remark-able is focused on providing solutions for Customer Value-led Growth, particularly tailored for SaaS (Software as a Service) companies. Markus is based in Austria and has over 45k+ Linkedin followers. X - @RentschMarkus

• ​​Conor McCarter, Co-Founder @ Prequel. Prequel is a platform that helps early-stage startups navigate the complexities of building and scaling their businesses. Before this Conor attended Harvard Business School and was a Growth Equity investor in Boston. X - @conormccarter

• ​Daniel Zarick CEO @ Arrows. Arrows is a customer onboarding platform that helps businesses create personalized onboarding experiences, streamline communication, and track progress to ensure customers get the most out of their products and services. Before this, he owned a design studio for 8+ years. X - @danielzarick

New Blog: Key Takeaways from our Bootstrapping in 2024 Conversation

A few weeks ago we had an hour long discussion with two great founders who are bootstrapping their businesses in 2024 and having great success. In a market where venture capital is so dominant, it is refreshing to hear how others are building successful products with their own capital. Read our key takeaways from the conversation below.

Talk soon,
Adam

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