Alex Konrad

A thanks for stopping by a demo table

When you sign up but don’t go to the event

Protein Diet: Inside The Bezos-Backed Biotech Training AI To Fight Disease Profluent CEO Ali Madani has raised $106M from Altimeter and Jeff Bezos to generate drug-boosting molecules from new AI models built with the world's largest protein dataset.

“Our mission is to program biology, to steer it using AI to cure disease."

Startup founder Ali Madani is training his own AI models to fight disease at Profluent, using what he says is the world's largest protein dataset.

Now he's raised $106M to scale. Our @upstarts.bsky.social interview 👇

Please don’t make me add /s to my jokes

Target partners with OpenAI

Target partnering with OpenAI is smart, but doesn't go far enough. The people obviously want in-store promotions on Nvidia Blackwell GPUs

The temptation to skip the work drinks and just hang out inside the Lego Store

This Startup Can Track If Your AI Code Is Worth It Span's 'developer intelligence' software helps Ramp and Vanta track how engineers spend their time, and which AI code editors they use. Now it's raised $25M from Craft Ventures and 100+ tech execs.

Exclusive: Span, a startup building a new-look 'developer intelligence' platform for the AI code era, has raised $25M.

Led by Lattice's former head of product J Zac Stein, Span already helps companies like Braze, Intercom, Ramp, Vanta and Writer keep track of their engineering and AI tool usage.

Ben Wyatt explains The Cones of Dunshire to the Pope

“Now the object is to accumulate Cones. Or Cones Wins. But, in order to get a Cone, you have to build a civilization…

Are the Cones a metaphor? Well, yes and no.”

someday i will be able to say or write the phrase "my wife" without a little voice shouting it in my head

today is not that day though

Newspaper article includes ChatGPT editing feedback

Newspaper correction says it violates “current” AI policy

We are so cooked

An opened cupboard drawer

The culprit Margot the dog

Our CEO spent too long at a VC dinner tonight (we’re not even raising!) so the @upstarts.bsky.social social media manager decided to learn a new skill.

Exclusive: Here's How Much OpenAI Spends On Inference and Its Revenue Share With Microsoft As with my Anthropic exclusive from a few weeks ago, though this feels like a natural premium piece, I decided it was better to publish on my free one so that you could all enjoy it. If you liked or f...

One benefit of OpenAI going public would be more transparency around its revenue and inference spend.

If numbers shared by @edzitron.com this AM are legit, there's a disconnect between what's widely reported and what can be reproduced from its Microsoft deal $ sums.

www.wheresyoured.at/oai_docs/

Just caught up with @alexrkonrad.bsky.social, founder of Upstarts Media, which launched earlier this year and has built a big fan base among tech industry insiders. Terrific follow if you want the inside scoop on trends, personalities, and innovation in the tech ecosystem bsky.app/profile/alex...

SuperMe founders Casey Winters and Ludo Antonov

Exclusive: SuperMe, a startup building a new-look AI expert network, has launched with $6.8M in funding and 3K profiles onboard.

CEO Casey Winters says they're tackling a simple problem: “How do you share the knowledge sitting in the heads of top 1% people?”

www.upstartsmedia.com/p/superme-la...

Gameto cofounder and CEO Dina Radenkovic Turner is taking on women's fertility and menopause.

"People thought it was insane." Now women's health startup Gameto has helped with 9 healthy births and raised $127M to date.

CEO Dina Radenkovic Turner spoke with
@upstarts.bsky.social about her startup's plans to take on menopause and ovarian health next.

www.upstartsmedia.com/p/exclusive-...

Of the age now where I got a good back crack getting out of bed, and I’ll now be thinking about it all day

His Drone Security Startup Almost Crashed. Now Sequoia's Investing $16M. Sunflower Labs CEO Alex Pachikov's startup almost went under during the pandemic. Now his autonomous drone system cuts security costs at commercial sites and high-net-worth homes.

Would you trust a drone security system at your business if it cost one-tenth the price of a guard?

Sunflower Labs seems smart for big footprint worksites — but it’s the startup’s turnaround from near-death that made me interested in covering its new round led by Sequoia in @upstarts.bsky.social.

LinkedIn is going to try to move into AI tools now, but I think the problem is that it's gotten too big and unwieldy, and the incentives aren't there. Hopefully a new entrant can keep value for the community members (not advertisers and corporate customers) firmly in mind.

My trusty wooden umbrella of the past 16 years did not survive today's windy rain in NYC 😭

Farewell, umbrella friend, you made it through 2 years of college, being momentarily forgotten at countless parties and dive bars, and at least 4 apartment moves. Stay dry in the sky 🫡

Can AI Help To Restore The Art Of Networking? Chief alum Caroline Dell's new startup Goodword, which combines AI insights with a personal touch, is launching with $4 million in funding led by Human Ventures to find out.

Many startups have tried and failed to solve the "tar pit" of a personal CRM for better keeping in touch with contacts.

So I'm genuinely excited to try Goodword, a new app that launched today. It uses AI to better track connections, but requires a human touch.

www.upstartsmedia.com/p/goodword-a...

My TikTok book is out in stores today!

Why should you read it? Because 1 in 5 Americans now get their news from this thing. We should all understand how it works.

It was inevitable that strongmen would seek to control a tool this powerful. The book is the story of what happened when they did.

Tech Reporter Alex Konrad on Going Independent with Upstarts, What Drives Subscribers (vs Just Views) and How He Uses AI in His Content Creation Got to know Alex while he was at Forbes, a tenure which basically made him one of, if not *the*, go-to reporters for exclusives launches and fund announcements. As a result of our friendship, I kne…

Really enjoyed this chat with the great @hunterwalk.com about what we're building at @upstarts.bsky.social as we approach our 6 month mark.

Feedback includes:

"You are SUCH a nerd my god" 🤓
and
"You really nailed the balance of promo + substance here!" 😂

Congrats, Alex!! Excited to subscribe

Console founders Andrei Serban and Neal Chandra

When I still worked at Forbes, I'd annoy our IT helpdesk by filing tickets to update Signal and WhatsApp seemingly every week.

One-year-old startup Console, which just raised $23M, uses AI agents to automate away basic IT requests like that.

www.upstartsmedia.com/p/console-ai...

Margot the dog

When Margot was a puppy, she tried to say hi to a skunk and got sprayed pretty bad. Years later, she still freaks out when she sees black and white dogs.

Which raises an important question: does she think the dogs are skunks, or that skunks are just a spooky kind of dog 🤔

— Scene: outside a fancy new Brooklyn high rise, 1pm —

Broker [suit, clipboard in hand]: sir, do you have an appointment?

Me [gym clothes, stomping on 50 spotted lanternflies]: no, just getting my steps in!

Upstarts editor Alex Konrad with Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski

Chatted with Klarna's CEO from NYSE during their IPO week.

We talked about what he learned from IKEA and Walmart, Klarna's evolving mission, his stance on crypto, personally vibe coding fixes for bad customer text messages, handling CEO pressure and much more.

www.upstartsmedia.com/p/klarna-ceo...

Esri Founder Jack Dangermond's 'Secrets' To Building A Legendary Business The 80-year-old software billionaire shares startup and life lessons that have kept him "all in" while running a high-impact global business for 50+ years.

Tech legend Jack Dangermond founded Esri in 1969. Now 80 years young and with a net worth of $10B+, he's still "all in" on his company and global mission.

@upstarts.bsky.social spent an hour with Jack this week for one of our best interviews yet, full of lessons on startup-building and life.

Intel Worked With Chinese Firms Sanctioned For Enabling Human Rights Abuses As the U.S. government takes a 10% stake in Intel, Forbes has learned the tech company partnered with sanctioned Chinese surveillance firms Uniview, Hikvision and Cloudwalk.

Intel has been touting partnerships with sanctioned Chinese surveillance firms as Trump announces that the USG is taking a stake in the company:

www.forbes.com/sites/emilyb...

Meta exec Alexandr Wang confirmed today's Upstarts scoop about Meta and Midjourney holding partnership talks in a short thread on X this afternoon 👀