The “Company Brain” Startup That 5X’d During YC

went from buying business class to literally living in the closet. You were living a life so many people dreamed of. Why give that all up? I think I was climbing the wrong hill.

" There have been so many unicorn founders that came out of this house. Hi Touch, which is now a unicorn, the three founders who work together here at this hacker house. You had this idea of building this hyper spell the brain for your company. It's not about individual agents, about a brain for your entire company that all the agents can tap into.

There's this spicy fund, Rebel Fund. They had a list of all the categories that make the best YC founder. " Guess who invested in our fundraising round? 10 million impressions on Twitter in the last year.

As a company, we haven't done any outbound at all. All of our customers have been inbound. We have former neuroscientist. Our head of go to market is a former soldier and was a semi-professional basketball player, played on the Israeli national team.

It's been a few months since you wrapped up YC. That's right. What is you and your team up to now? We are very close to closing another Fortune 500 that I used to work for as a consultant.

So, I'm supposed to be meeting Connor, a founder, and he told me this location. Um I I don't know if this is it. Where is Oh, wait. I think that's him.

Hey, are you Connor? Hey. Yeah, I am. Julia.

Hi, Julia. Nice to meet you. for the podcast. Oh, okay, cool.

Yeah, do you want to do it right now? Oh, like right right now? Yeah. Okay.

All right, let's go. Okay, sweet. So, we're going to do some fill-in-the-blanks. You ready?

Okay. You grew up on a farm in Scotsville, western New York, population 2,000. You dropped out of school at 12 and started college at 13. Wow.

You spent years at Boston Consulting Group advising really big companies and then you gave it all up to live in a hacker house, Mission Control. It's actually right here if you want to see it. Oh, that's the hacker house? Yeah, yeah.

This is the right here. I know it's not obvious with this abandoned building, but do you want to go see? And what are you building? Uh I'm building Hyperspell.

Hyperspell is your company, Brain. That is so sick. Okay, yeah, let's do the tour. Cool.

And also, is it true that you lived in a closet? Uh I did live in a closet, yeah. We can we can go see it. Oh my god.

So So this is where it all started. Where it all began. So Connor, you used to live here? That's right.

I lived here for a full year in the early days when I was starting Hyperspell. Oh my gosh. So we're approaching the first floor. That's right.

What does this area mean to you? Yeah, so I started off when I first moved to MC, I was living downstairs um in that room over there. And you know, this floor was the really early days of Hyperspell. Um the original company name was not Hyperspell.

So we called the company EchoAI um cuz the idea was like a digital echo of employees, you know, it gets all the context from a person. Uh but it was in this very room where we decided to change the name to Hyperspell. " Cuz the problem was with EchoAI, there were five other companies named EchoAI. com.

So we we I bought it in this very room when it all started. That's so nostalgic. Yeah, it's it's good memories. It brings me back to all this time.

Um you know, it was fun being surrounded by friends in the early days of building. What's over there? Uh yeah, so over here is our uh So this was this was my room when I first moved in here. Um So we were originally building our own AI agents um and then we realized that like none of these agents were useful without having the right context.

And I kept thinking back to when I was working at in consulting at BCG, you know, I'd work inside of all these big companies and there's so so many people's jobs that are just like moving information around, you know, they're middle management. They would talk to this person, update that person. " Um and that's part of where the idea for Hyperspace was born. Yeah.

What is this shed? Yeah, so this is So the amazing thing about Michigan Troll is at any one time there'll be between um 10 and 17 people living at Michigan Troll. Uh and this is one of the places where people have lived in the past. Um and so uh you know, we have it's a 10-bedroom house.

So founders will live in the house, but a lot of founders have lived here while they were early in bootstrapping or just raised you know, small funding kind of like me. Um and so there was one guy who uh wanted to place to stay in the house, but there were no rooms available. So he built this shed where we're sitting now and then stayed in the shed for 6 months while he was early in his company. Um and so it's nice because, you know, Michigan Troll, it's a very gritty place.

Like if you come here, you know, you saw the abandoned storefront outside. If you come here, it's cuz you really really want to build something and you're very committed and you want to make it happen. Think that's part of the reason why there have been so many unicorn founders that came out of this house. What are some like cool people that Oh man, well, um have you heard of uh Scale AI?

Oh yeah, so yeah, yeah. Yeah, so Scale AI, um one of the founders lived here. Um Lucy, yeah. Uh Hightouch, um the founders actually met here.

And uh Pylon, the founder Marty lived here and he got his first customer from the house. There's another roommate in the house, which is unbelievable story. Um there's a bunch of other ones. Truewind, Feathery, uh Pallet, one of the founders lived here.

dev. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. Um, there's even, you know, there's this legend that Vitalik Buterin would crash here on couches for weeks at a time, um, early in the days before he founded Ethereum. You know, and the funniest thing was, uh, so, um, Dylan Field from Figma actually spoke to our YC batch.

And, uh, I got a chance to chat with him afterwards, and, uh, you know, we were talking, and I mentioned I lived in Michigan Control. And immediately his face lit up. He's like, "Oh, I remember Michigan Control. You know, I spent so many time there.

Uh, I may have crashed there a few nights, um, you know, and, uh, because it was a Teal fellows house originally. Um, it was founded around 2014, and it was all Teal fellows that lived in the house working at other companies. So, it's a nice place to be. " And so, I'm Wait, I'm curious.

Did you know about the history before coming to Michigan Control? How did you hear about it? yeah. Well, well, you know, it's funny.

My story at Michigan Control actually started even before I lived here. So, I was crashing in a uh, uh, another house, and, you know, I was early on in my company journey, and, um, I didn't have a co-founder yet. " And so, uh, I'd been to a few events at the house. I was friends with people in the house, and they encouraged me to apply to the Undeck Fellowship, ODF.

" And so, I was actually hanging out in Michigan Control down the hallway there, um, when I sent in my ODF application, uh, which is a program to, you know, find co-founders for people that are early in building. Now, the crazy thing was, I got rejected from ODF, and I was still in the house, and I got the rejection email. " And so, I asked the other people in the house. They were like, "Oh, yeah, we know them.

No, it's fine. " So, I said, "All right. Well, actually, I'm open to finding a new co-founder. " And then ODF changed their minds, to their credit.

And he came back. He's like, "Okay, great. Thanks for the contacts. " And that's where I met my co-founder that we're working together today at Hyperspace.

And I got into Ondeck while I was in this house. I applied. I wasn't even living here. I was just hanging out with friends here and so MC was very much part of my journey, you know, from the earliest days and I knew the community.

I liked the people from the community. I was living in another house nearby and it was always it's always a dream to become part of this community. Let's go check out the room over there. I see there's like a kitchen.

So, um this is, you know, if you're a truly locked in founder, uh you are a gym founder. And so there's there's lots of stories with MC, you know, there's many founders that have lived here over the years and there's a story that one of the founders of Pallet was living in this room and he would stay up super super late at night working and then there was another founder who would come and work out here super early in the morning. And a lot of times they would run into each other at like 5:00 in the morning, you know, as this guy was going to sleep and this guy was waking up to work out. And so it's very much a people where, you know, a place where there's all of these locked in focused individuals.

So yeah, this is this is the room the workspace at MC where I originally applied to Ondeck where I met my co-founder. Okay. And so where a lot of this originally started. Um I was at one of these desks, you know, and then I got that initial rejection email and then I responded back to it, turned things around and got in.

Um and there's so much history in this room, you know, this is still I drew this. It's still up here. Yeah, yeah. This is early early in the days of Hyperspace, you know, we were It's not a No one's erasing it?

No one's erased it yet. Yeah. Still there almost a year later. how early state at Hyperspace like what what do we see here?

Yeah, well this is originally, you know, we originally um building out the the product. Again, it's like the the one central store of context for your entire company. And you can see this is pulling from this is Slack and Google Drive and email and um uh messages and then, you know, extracting the data from it, transforming it, turning it into one company brain. And so, you can see here this is like the early sketches of when we were first mapping out our architecture and building it.

Let's take a seat here. Yeah. And and is there some lore that happened in this room? Oh, there's so much lore.

Well, I I told you about, you know, I applied to OnDeck in this room, which is where I met my co-founder. And I got rejected initially. And but they sent me this email, you know, let us know if there's anything that we missed or misunderstood. And so, I sent them this long explanation and OnDeck, to their credit, changed their mind.

That's where I met my co-founder. That's how it all started. But there was another rejection that happened in this room. So, I met my co-founder, things were going well, and we really we decided that we wanted to do YC.

We thought it'd be a great um uh a great community, a great way to kind of uh bring our infrastructure to other companies. And so, we applied to YC a few times. And in total, we got rejected from YC six times. And that last rejection actually happened in this room.

So, we did the interview over there at one of the uh one of the the desks. Um talked to the the partners and it was in this very room that uh you know, uh we kind of like did the interview. And then the next day I got the email with the news um that we didn't get in. But it's all right cuz on the seventh time we got in.

And I'll tell you more about that soon. Okay. And before we get into more of that, let's go all the way back. I mean, you mentioned you were living like such a great life in New York City working as a consultant.

I mean, you were living a life so many people dreamed of. Why give that all up? You know, it's funny cuz in some ways it was my dream, too. Like I grew up in this tiny town, 2,000 people, grew up on a farm.

I was super into sci-fi as a kid. I was building LEGO robots. I dropped out of school at 12 cuz I wanted to teach myself and I kind of, you know, didn't fit in, started college at 13. And I, um, I really wanted to be in a place where there were kind of opportunities opening up for me and, um, being at the center of the world because I came from this, you know, very, very small town.

And so, um, ended up getting a job at BCG and I was working with some of the biggest companies in the world, you know, Walmart, Pfizer, and MetLife, and, um, and advising them on really important stuff and having calls with CEOs. And living in New York City, living this, you know, um, very bougie lifestyle, honestly. But there was a part of me deep down that was still that kid that loved sci-fi and building LEGO robots. And I wasn't really happy.

I was like, I I'm enjoying advising these folks, but I really want to build things and I really want to create things and have impact in the world instead of just advising others. And so, you know, I was on the track to, uh, if I had stayed there, um, uh, could have kind of worked my way up the ladder and, uh, decided to give all that up and start completely over again and moved to San Francisco. And I knew no one in San Francisco at that time. And so, uh, went from, you know, flying business class to literally living in the closet here at this hacker house, um, because I just really wanted to build things and create things.

And I was much happier being in the closet working on something that I was really passionate about than I was, you know, flying in, uh, working in a fancy office, um, building out PowerPoint slides for big companies. Oh my gosh. Where did this like instinct to want to build something of your own come from? Like, like do you did you have anyone like you looked up to when you were younger?

Yeah, I think it was, I mean, as a as a kid I was super into sci-fi and I was just I was always building things. I was always creating. Um, and it was there was that instinct for creation that was like embedded deep inside of me. And, you know, I was lucky enough to uh well, I was a consultant, did a few projects where we like built products from scratch or created something new and then headed off to our clients and I found that I enjoyed that much more than just kind of giving advice.

It's like having something tangible that you've created. Um I think there was also, you know, I I noticed working at some of these big companies that people were spending so much time and effort on just moving information around. You know, there's whole layers of middle management whose whole job is to just like trans like context from one place to another, coordinate. And in the back of my head, I was like, there's got to be a better way to do this.

You know, there's like with AI wasn't a thing at the time, but with technology, there's got to be a better way to solve this problem and a better way to run companies. Um and I started off doing that by giving advice, you know, but you can only make companies so efficient through advice. And that problem stuck with me. That's what ultimately led to what we're doing at Hyperspace today.

Wow. But even before building Hyperspace, the brain for your company, you were you were like doing some other things, like you pivoted, right? Yeah, so we were originally building our own agents. Um so when we were uh when we started Hyperspace, we were it was called Echo AI and we were building agents to help product managers.

And so they would um complete a lot of your busy work and get things done. But we found that agents weren't useful without context. And so the agents needed context from Gmail and Slack and Notion, all these different places in a company. And again, like in the back of my head, I kept thinking about all these big companies I'd work with.

I was like, wait a minute, there's an opportunity here and now with AI to solve a lot of those coordination problems that people used to have in big companies. And so um that all those two ideas kind of came together. Uh we started off thinking, okay, we'll build memory and context for agents and then realized, wait, that's that's thinking too small. Like it's not about individual agents, it's about a brain for for entire company that all the agents can tap into.

And And so why why did you initially decide cuz you had this idea of building this um brain for your company for a while now? Why did you decide to start with like agents and contacts? " I think actually how it really works is it's more like a sculptor. Like slowly chipping away and you get the shape.

" I think those make great stories later. I think it was I noticed this problem and in consulting and we spent so much time solving this problem, you know, I remember doing projects in like 2018 where I was helping leaders figure out their span of control, right? And like moving around the org and figuring out how many people should report to this person and hearing over and over again like, "Okay, information is in silos. How do we break down silos?

" I did a whole projects around like knowledge management and knowledge sharing. I even did this project where I would like I was, you know, manually copying and pasting data from these different sources into slides and I automated it with VBA and pulled in data. " What does that like look like in real life? Yeah, so when you think about human organizations today, right?

You have a boss and then you have people at the front line whether they're doing product or engineering or sales. And what happens is humans spend so much time just coordinating today. So, all meetings are as coordination, right? You're sharing information from one person to another.

And it turns out human beings are not very good at, you know, reading details in Slack, at diving, digging through information, or figuring out what's relevant and what's not relevant. And so, right now there's so much time and energy lost in productivity, and there's whole people whose jobs they don't actually execute anything. Their job is to like talk to the boss, take what the boss, you know, does and translate that to the execution layer. And there's an opportunity now with AI for to put AI at the center of every company and have AI be that coordination layer.

And then the humans are kind of the execution path. Um, and you could see this with, you know, Claude code, with cursor, with co-work. All these tools natively don't have any understanding of your company or how you work or how people operate. And so, you as the human, you're spending all your time trying to feed them context.

You're acting like those middle managers. And with Hyperspell, now there's a way for all those agents to instantly have the context of your company, know who's working on what, know who owns what, know the priorities, know the projects, know everything else you're talking to. So that I can be on a sales call, and somebody in a totally different department who's uh, talking to a similar customer, suddenly connects the dots and hears something that this customer talks about, and then maybe ships a feature from it, maybe uses it in marketing campaign. It's instant communication and instant context.

And that's something we've never had in human organizations before. Never. There's no No, no. And I And I think if you talk to people, the reason that people like working at small companies is because you don't spend a lot of time on coordination, right?

The The reason people love working at startups is you can all be in the same room, you all have context, you all contribute. There's no status updates, there's not that many meetings, you don't need to do all hands, you don't need to like fill out all these docs. You can spend most of the time actually doing things. But the problem is as companies get bigger, you're spending more and more and more and more of your time on these coordination tasks.

And that's what I saw again, I did projects for like some of the biggest companies in the world, you know, Walmart and Pfizer and MetLife. And like these are incredible companies and leaders in their field, but so many people at them spend so much time day-to-day just coordinating because there was no better option. We didn't have a better option until AI and now we finally have the opportunity to fix this problem. And that's why you're the best person to solve this problem cuz you've like experienced it first.

Like you have so much that like like you have so much knowledge in this area. Yeah, I don't think there's there's I at least I don't know of any other founder that has both you know, I spent some years in tech too building products and working on API products. And my co-founder has been in machine learning for 15 years. He his story is crazy.

He founded his first AI company in 2014. He had a dot AI domain name in 2014. That's crazy. He 2014.

That's But AI wasn't a thing. It wasn't a thing. It was during in the middle of AI winter. So you know what he called this company?

ai um as a play on the AI winter which was uh the ongoing at that time. ai existed. ai and do you know what country the dot AI domain name is from? No.

So it's from Anguilla, tiny island in the Caribbean. And you couldn't buy the domain names online at that point. So he sent a fax message to the government of the island of Anguilla to buy that domain name. And then that company got acquired by Airbnb in 2017.

And he built the first knowledge graph at Airbnb. And you got to remember his background is in neuroscience. So he was a neuroscientist and then spent 15 years in machine learning. So you look at those two backgrounds, right?

I have this like enterprise experience, have worked with some of the biggest companies in the world, have seen how they operate, have tried to solve some of these problems, you know, working with CEOs and execs. And he's been in machine learning for 15 years and studying how the human brain operates and we're putting those two sides together to build the brain for companies. Um and I think I don't think there's anybody else in the world that has that combination of experiences. Yeah.

And let's talk about like the privacy. Uh like do you think some people would find this like uncomfortable like knowing that but then I also think it's like with the brain it's not like they're so like they're watching. It's like the brain you're just like Yeah. Like what's the privacy?

Yeah. So I think that um so we have different permissions on this, right? So there is information that's shared in companies that you don't necessarily want to be public. Here's an obvious example, right?

If someone's getting fired, maybe the entire company shouldn't know the performance feedback for that person. Um or maybe it's maybe you're just doing a surprise party for someone's birthday and you don't want that person to know about the surprise beforehand. There is this idea of private information in companies and so the way that we handle that is when we create this company brain, there's different levels of context and sharing. So there is the global brain for the company.

Everybody should know what the company's mission is, what the values are, things like revenue, um like all of this should be shared. But then there's also sometimes you have teams that are working on specific things. So you have team specific context and so it's divided by specific teams. Some teams everything they do is public.

Everybody should know about it. Some teams are like skunk works and they need to keep it within the team. And then finally you have the individual context. The individual context is just things about how you work and you can choose to share some of that with the organization if you want, but most of it might be things that are only relevant for you as an individual person.

And so we give you control over things that are in your Slack DMs, that are you're sending emails about, that are personal to you. And so you know, this is how human organizations operate anyways. And so now there's this uh there's this chance to actually have AI solve this instead. What does a world without a company brain look like?

Yeah, well, you know, it's fascinating when you think about the evolution of human coordination. We started off as these very small small tribes making things happen, you know, you'd go and have a hunting party. And then, um, over time you'd get bigger and bigger organizations. So, the canonical example of this is the Roman legion where you would have like a a general and below that you'd have centurions.

There's all these different names and each person would have like five to eight people reporting to them. Um, and that's kind of that command and control hierarchy is the way that we built all these big companies. You look at any company with hundreds of thousands of people, it's all there's layers and layers and layers and layers of management and people whose whole job it is to like coordinate between departments and move information around and move resources around. And we spend a lot of money on this.

We spend a lot of time on this. And I think if you really talk to most middle managers, like most people want to have impact in their lives, right? They want to make a difference. They want to be able to change something.

And I know, uh, a lot of my friends who have moved into some of these management positions struggle with their whole job is just achieving things through other people, right? And their whole job is kind of moving resources around. And so, what if we could free up people to all be the ones executing on things? And that's why people love working at startups, you know, at small companies.

There is no middle management. There's just people executing and you all have contacts and you're all in the same room and you all know what's going on. There's no status alignment meetings. There's no project trackers.

There's no all-hands. Like all these things that we've created that people are spending hours and sometimes entire careers on, um, can just happen ambiently. What if every company felt like a startup where most of what you're doing is actually making things happen. If you're a sales person, spending all your day focused on the customer relationship instead of updating your CRM, instead of giving updates to teams and reporting.

If you're a marketer, spending all your time creating content and thinking about storyline instead of like uh doing status updates to the CMO. You know, if you're an engineer, it's like managing your fleet of agents and making things happen instead of talking to the product manager and talking to sales. You would if you can instantly have context of what customers need. I think that is the opportunity here is for every single person to focus on the things that they do really well and spend as little time as possible in meetings and status updates and docs and all these kind of coordination tasks that don't really matter and don't really move the company forward.

And so, that's a problem I'm personally really passionate to solve. And just like hearing about you speaking about I could really see the the passion and the impact you want to make. And would this mean that like corporations are we won't have to have to do do a lot of like crazy all hands meetings or like all Yeah, like these are Yeah, I think there's a there's a lot of time and energy that's spent like just managing people and moving things around and you know, sending updates. And look, there's value in for example, doing offsites and bringing people together and connection.

But just doing information sharing just to share information, there's a better way to do that. And that's why you can have the company brain at the center of it handling all these coordination tasks so that people can focus on getting things done. You know, it's funny. I I was a a product manager um uh before starting this between consulting and founding this company.

" But then I found that I spent most of my day as a PM just moving contacts around. It's like, "Oh, talk to the sales team, understand what the customers need, turn that into requirements for engineering. " And like my day was just full of meetings. And and like I was like, "Wait a minute.

" between all these teams, you know, sharing things back and forth. And that's you know, PM is probably one of the most fun jobs there are there are. Um and so I saw the problem there. I had seen it at BCG in big companies previously.

I had experienced it even working at these startups as a PM and then experienced it again when building agents at Echo AI and it all kind of came together and was like, wait, we need one brain for your company, one way to do handle all these coordination tasks and bring all the context to new, um make it real and immediate so that all the agents and humans have access to it. That's awesome. Yep. So Connor, what does this floor mean to you?

Uh so this floor was pretty significant, you know, my first 6 months were downstairs and then I moved up here. Um this is the floor where I was in that room over there when we did the YC interview um and then in the same room when we got in, we got the call from the partner. Uh and people at Michigan Troll were the first people I told. They heard me yelling from my room and I came out and like, guys, we got into YC.

Uh it was a big moment of celebration. Um this was also the floor where I lived in a closet. Uh and so at one point, you know, we didn't have a lot of money um and we were still kind of figuring things out, got rejected from YC a few times uh and was so determined, like I have to make this work, but I also need to save money, my funds are running low, that I subletted out my room and moved into live in a bed in the closet instead. Um and so this is kind of the crucible, you know, from that rock bottom moment to then when everything turned around, um we got into YC, uh we got some of our first customers and this floor.

Um uh we, you know, closed many of those customers on calls in this very room um and once we started closing those customers and I got in, everything took off from there. What's something else like cool that happened? Well, so I'm not the only person to have pretty significant history of my company in this room. So one of the founders of Scale AI lived in that room.

Um High Touch, which is now a unicorn, the three founders uh were all solo founders that were kind of pivoting around and uh, decided, you know, we don't know what we want to work on, but we know we like each other and so they are all roommates and decided to work together in this very room, you know, legend has it while sitting on those couches. Maybe they were in the ball pit, I don't know. Um, and then and one of them also lived in the closet, you know, so it's a unicorn closet. And uh, this was also the space where um, Marty, the founder of Pylon, got his first customer.

And so he uh, he was talking to folks in this floor, they mentioned they had this problem tracking customer requests in Slack. That's where the idea for Pylon came and Pylon, you know, now a series B company doing really well. And so there's something magical about this space, you know, and it's it's changed a lot of founders' lives. It continues to change founders' lives.

There's somebody else living in the closet today. Um, and I'm I'm very feel very lucky to be part of that story. Can we look at this unicorn closet? let's check it out.

Let's check it out. This is a a special space. I think Alex wouldn't mind. Okay, so this is the place this where I slept for multiple months.

Um, and here it is. Um, that is the closet itself. So there's not a lot there. It's uh, just kind of a bed in the space.

Um, it's actually not that bad, honestly. Like when you're very focused, it's very easy to sleep there cuz there are no windows. And um, when you're really focused founder, you don't really need anything else in your room, you know, it's kind of I would go in there to sleep and then I would wake up and I was like, well, I need to get to work, you know, I need to make things happen. And so I think it's extremely motivating and I remind myself of this.

Um, you know, there's many ups and downs on the founder journey, but reminding myself of being in the closet and being like, I am not giving up, you know, I'm just going to keep going and uh, just going to keep trying cuz we really believed in this vision and this idea and still believe in it today. And even now when things are going really well, I remember back to that. I'm like, let's just keep that motivation going. So having this like big vision in mind, it was that your guiding light to like kind keep you going?

Yeah, I think you know, I think it's a few things. Like I I again thought back to that problem that I saw first hand in consulting and that I experienced, you know, as a PM at multiple unicorn companies and experienced that first hand. And uh I just really felt like this is the thing that I'm supposed to do in the world, you know? And so there was never a moment of like should I just give up or get a job?

You know, at some points my parents were like, all right, maybe you should get health insurance again and you know, but uh but I think there was always this sense deep down for myself and my co-founder that like this is what we are meant to do in the world and um we're going to figure out a way one way or another and you know, what I deeply believe is like if you just keep pushing enough, eventually the universe kind of bends to you. And so um I think, you know, feedback like failure means that you're getting in contact with reality. And so you don't get rejected from YC six times until unless you apply six times, right? There are other people who have great ideas and they never get around to applying so they never get rejected.

Um so I try to I try to fail, you know, I think failure is good and you if you're not failing enough, you're not trying hard enough and you're not pushing enough and then eventually most things work out. Um I actually got rejected from Mission Control the first time I applied. Funnily enough, yeah. Even here like I I interviewed downstairs and um uh you know, for whatever reason it wasn't a good fit, but then six months later some people from the house came back and said, hey, actually, you know, we would love for you to join the community.

And so um I think uh I think everything in my life that's worked out has never worked out the first time. Usually it's worked out the second or third time and I think uh you just need to get those first two out of the way as fast as possible and learn from them. And just that's like one signal of that like you're meant to be a founder. Some like cuz you're never going to give up like no matter what.

absolutely not. Like we could survive being in the closet and like running low on money and getting rejected from YC over and over again and like and even in those moments I was happy in a way that I never was at BCG because like you know working this fancy job it's like yes it matters for our clients and yes I want to deliver for them and has a lot of impact on their business but the stakes are different you know it's like I'm not I'm not the CEO I'm advising the CEO or advising the team you know I'm not in their shoes and here even in those moments when I was in the closet getting rejected it felt so real it's like I'm doing something that matters I'm putting myself out there and you know and I I think it's it's important to like for me at least I feel so alive even when like things don't work perfectly you feel so much more alive than kind of being in a cushy space where things are going well for you What's your take on cuz people that I know in my life always tell me that you should learn from other people's mistakes and not your own mistakes what are your thoughts Well I think I think I would separate mistakes from failure so I think that you should learn as much as possible from mistakes and like have mentors and talk to people and figure out what works and what doesn't but the reality is you can only spend so much time gathering information before you like shoot your shot and go for things so like when we applied to YC and got rejected like we'd be getting feedback on our application and running it through people but like but eventually you just need to do it and get into contact with reality and I think that's true for everything you know like we when we were originally building Echo AI we had paying customers we had people that were paying us for this agent and we decided to give it all up and start over again and build context infrastructure instead and then we spent months trying to get our first customer with the context infrastructure which was like a little disheartening cuz it was like wait we raised money you know we we had customers and we gave everything up to start over again but I think that's the other big takeaway is like you should never be afraid to give up what you have and I think in some ways you know I I enjoyed my experience in New New in consulting I learned a lot I enjoyed my experiences unicorn startups, but I think I was climbing the wrong hill. You know, I was like living somebody else's dream and I got to the peak of it and I was like, "Wait a minute, I'm not actually sure this is me. " And so, gave it all up, went back to the bottom again, lived in the closet and now here we are.

And so, I think that's a lesson for for any builder, really anyone, is like life is too short to you know, spend your time being successful at something that you're not super excited to do. Honestly, kudos to you because a lot of people changes hard, but you like a lot of people just stay and And and you know, they make it really in consulting, they make it really attractive. You're always 2 years away from the promotion, you got cushy benefits, you know, you're doing interesting stuff and um and folks talk a lot about exit options. It's like, "Well, you could do all this stuff.

" But, you know, having doors open only means something if you actually walk through the doors. And at some point, you got to walk through the door and take about on yourself, even if you walk through the door and then, you know, fall flat on your face and end up living in the closet. Yeah. We're in the ball pit right now.

Yeah. I think this is a perfect time to talk a little bit more about your childhood. Yeah. So, you grew up on a farm.

This is your parents' farm, yeah? I did. Yeah. So, we had a small suburban farm.

Um Uh my parents were a nurse and a midwife and had this farm in our backyard with chickens and goats and sheep and ducks. Um and so, as a kid, I um it was my job to feed and water the animals, let them in and out, to dig the duck pond, to patch the fence. Sometimes I'd be late for school cuz I had to like chase down a chicken before going to school. Um and it was a really cool, you know, it taught a lot of responsibility from an early age because I was like responsible for these animals and I remember one time when I was a 9-year-old, like I forgot to close the animals in at night and then a raccoon got in and killed a bunch of the chickens.

" Um and so, really glad I had that experience. I think it it taught me a lot about kind of like ownership um from an early age. I'm curious, when did you get your first phone? When did you Oh god, 13, 14?

Okay. Later on, yeah. I didn't have a lot of screens growing up. We didn't have a TV until I was like 7 years old.

Um so, Reading books Yeah, I read it I read a lot of books. Um I spent a lot of time just playing with Legos as a kid. You know, I read a lot of sci-fi, I was a huge sci-fi kid. I once uh I once got in trouble with the library because I racked up like hundreds of dollars in library fines cuz I would check out like 50 books at once, then I wouldn't return them cuz I, you know, I wasn't done with all of them.

Uh and so, uh yeah, super curious kid and super um interested in the world around me. Yeah. Why did you drop out of school? What was school not teaching you that you're like Yeah, well, you know, it was a pretty small rural school.

I mean, town of 2,000 people, tiny school. Um and uh I think that, you know, I kind of never fit in as a kid. Uh I've been pretty open about being like super ADHD and autistic and just like was was very curious and very interested in the world, but felt like I was being confined being in the classroom and I would like sneak books and read them under my desk or like, you know, try to sneak Legos into classroom and be working on them. Um uh and I remember once I got in trouble cuz I corrected a teacher cuz she said something and it turned out it was factually incorrect.

And so, I corrected her and she was not happy about that and sent me to the principal's office and I was right. And to this day, I maintain I was right. But, you know, as uh she didn't appreciate that like a 8-year-old was correcting her. Um and so, yeah, I just realized I was like, "You know what?

" Um and I was already kind of trying to do that and like chafing against the system. And so, I went to my parents and kind of pushed and pushed and pushed and finally when I was 12, they were like, you know what? Like, we trust you. Clearly, you're you're self-motivated and you want to kind of be the architect of your own education, so we're going to let you do that.

Um and so, uh officially, I was registered as homeschooled, but you know, unofficially, it's like my parents were both working, so I would just um every day kind of figure out, okay, what do I want to learn and how? And that's when I got into robotics and LEGO like LEGO robots was my first entry into it. Got super into sci-fi. I was doing internships with friends' parents.

Um but eventually, there were certain topics that it was really hard to learn on your own. We're in this small rural village, you know, I couldn't drive cuz I was a kid. Uh and so, especially math and science and lab sciences. And so, I looked in the local community college, um had some classes I was really interested in.

And then I was just unbelievably persistent and annoying to them. Honestly, like I just kept, you know, showing up over and over again and I like sent them a list of all the books I had read and the robots I had built. And then finally, they were like, all right, you can do one class and we'll try with that class and see how it goes. And if it goes well, maybe you can do another one.

And I did this one class as a 13-year-old. And then at the end of the class, the professor didn't know I was 13. He recommended me for the honors college. He was like, which is a, you know, recommendation-only, the professor recommends you.

And then after that, they were like, all right, fine, you know, you can go go all in. And so, yeah, it was it was kind of wild. I think I've always been very used to standing out and and being different from everyone around me. Um and in a lot of ways, that that experience at college at 13 was part of that.

Yep. What was your first job? Uh so, I was a cashier at Arby's through a rest stop, you know, again, small town, rural rural job. And it's funny, that was So, before that, I was like, you know, I was always kind of curious as a kid and um uh but I was I had terrible social skills.

Like had no idea how to talk to people or communicate with people or make eye contact or anything. And uh it was at that job, I would I remember I was a cashier and I would like wasn't making small talk. I was just staring at the ground while handing people their change. " I was like, "Well, I don't know how to do that.

" And then she told me, she was like, "Oh, like here's how you make small talk. " And then a light bulb went off in my head. I was like, "Wait a minute. You can learn social skills.

Like you don't need to be natively born with them. " And so, I went to the library and checked out every single book I could find on like human communication and conversations and eye contact and like all these social social rules that most people are born with. And then I spent that whole summer uh when I was 16 working at this freeway rest stop, where I was like, "Okay, I would do 8-hour long shifts. And I I I I approached it in like the most artistic way imaginable.

" And then I would spend 8 hours in that day as the cashier or try to talk to them about things. I had flashcards with like, "This is what a happy face looks like. " And I would memorize those and then try to recognize expressions on people's faces. And then um yeah, over time, I think I just like kept at it, was super intense about it.

And now I'm, you know, running FounderLedSales at a startup. Spent years as a consultant. Like uh I you know, turned into something that because I was so focused on it, went from a weakness into a strength. And I just kind of like wasn't going to give up until I mastered this.

So, this is how you go about a lot of things. You're very like um like you know folk like when you start doing something, you're super focused on just not going to give up. Like there's you know the Will Smith has this quote. " And I think ever since I was a kid, I've always been that way.

I just like when I get something in my mind, it is going to happen one way or another. There's never been anything in my life that um I really really want to make happen that I wasn't able to find a way to make happen. Um, and so, uh, yeah, I think that, you know, one day, like I created this Tiz the Riz matrix on Twitter, and I think one day I'll have a biography, and it'll be called from Tiz the Riz. Um, and, uh, So, you're hearing it here first?

Yeah, yeah, you heard it here first, right? Uh, but yeah, I mean, that was a it was a challenge I really had as as a kid. Um, but then I think was able to turn that around, and then now it's weird, because now I feel like I'm maybe too much Riz for Silicon Valley. I had to dial it down, you know, a bit, and start, uh, start dressing down, and being more chill, um, uh, in order to be in kind of the Silicon Valley environment, yeah.

Okay. Do you think it's important to know how to give up sometimes? Like, because I feel like there are parts like, there's moments where you you want to keep pushing, but it's just not, like, this something just not working, you need to make this pivot. Like, when do you know when you should, like, So, I think that I don't think give up is the right term.

I think, like, like, for example, moving from Echo AI to Hyperspace, and going from building agents to building infrastructure, I fully believe if we stuck with the original idea, we could have made it work. And there are companies now that are building what we were building back then, who are super successful, and doing really well. Like, I think you can make anything work eventually. I think the question is, is this the perfect path for you to be on?

And if it feels like going uphill, and you're not you don't feel like this is the perfect place for you to be, then maybe you should change direction. But it's never about giving up. I I I don't think, like, I don't think you ever really lose, right? Even if, like, let's say you don't sell a customer.

Well, they can come back to you later, right? And you can sell them, or like, uh, you know, I remember even applying to BCG, like, I didn't get in the first time, and I took that rejection letter, and I framed it, and put it up on my wall. I'm like, I am not going to stop until I work at this place, and then I did, you know. Uh, so, yeah, I I think it's like I think it's knowing when to pivot is important.

But you should pivot because of it's because of you. Because you realize that there's this bigger opportunity over here and that you're climbing the wrong hill. Um and you know, it's similar for like it was really hard for me to get to New York and get the life I had there. It was really hard for me to go from that to being a PM at unicorn startups.

And then it was really hard again to start over as a founder. But in every decision I was like, well, is this the hill I want to climb for the rest of my life? No, it's not. I mean, find a new hill.

Um and so uh yeah. I I think I think that's the right way to live life. And I I really think that like you are not like none of us are lottery tickets, right? Like to give you an example, um there's this YC fund Rebel Fund and they had a list of all the categories that make the best YC founders.

And it was like, well, you went to XYZ school and you worked at this company and you're 22 years old. And like my co-founder and I looked at the list and we're like, we meet none of those criteria, zero. And this is they have a machine learning algorithm they use to make decisions. Well, guess who invested in our fundraising round?

That same one. That same company. And it just goes to show like you know, all these things are the world has a certain way that it's organized, but you're an individual and you can always find a way to make things happen. Very very good advice.

Where are we entering next? Yeah, so um this was the room where we did the final YC interview where we got in. And this was the room where um I was when I finally got the news and got the call from uh Tom, who's our YC partner, where he told us like, "Hey, you guys got in. You're finally part of YC.

" And you know, it's funny because I was working here before I took the interview. Originally we had planned to prep for the interview. Um and uh I was I was sitting here and we were supposed to do a call. We were supposed to do all this stuff.

And then the night before the interview happened, um our one of our customers had an issue that was urgent. And so the whole morning of the interview, we were like trying to fix it and make sure that it worked for them. And then we shipped the final fix and it was like a few minutes before the interview and I went to my new and my co-founder and I was like, well, I guess we're not prepping like, you know. But it it felt like the right decision because that decision to focus on the customer and to put them above everything else.

I was like, well, even if we don't get in this time like it was the right move to put the customer first and make sure that they're happy. Um and funnily enough, that was the time that we actually got in. Uh and so got accepted, came out into this room and a bunch of people, you know, Mischief Trolls an incredible community of other founders and I told everybody and they were super excited and we celebrated together. Um and so this room has a lot of meaning for me, you know, this is definitely like the next There was the early phase of the journey where we went from Echo AI to Hyper Spell and then this was the phase.

Um we also sold our first few paying customers in this room and the other room. Uh and then this was the moment where we we got into YC and when that that was definitely a trajectory changing moment for us. Let's talk more about customer obsession. So your phrase is make customers the hero.

Yeah, that's right. look differently from just being customer focused? Yeah, so I think in the early days like we really took this I I really believe that you can't be your company only exists in the impact that you have with customers and I don't think you can be too close to the customer. So some of the things we were doing in the early days is we didn't have an office.

I would work out of my customers offices. I would go and just like spend the entire day with them. We grab lunch together and I learn about their, you know, their problems and what they're working through and like beyond just our product like I would help them with marketing. I would I was selling our customers product at one point.

I was going door-to-door with donuts trying to sell their product just because I wanted to help them win. Um and you know, another example like we literally uh we had a customer who was based in Los Angeles and we were doing these call us in installations is what YC calls it, where you go in person to a customer's offices. And we did 26 of these during YC, where we would like go to a customer's offices, meet with them in person, get them all set up, and we, you know, we drove to Fremont. Um we went all over There's this guy who is building out of his garage.

We went to all kinds of co-working spaces. Um but there was one customer who was based in LA, and he was onboarding with us, and I was like, well, I want you to have the same in-person experience as everyone else. So we flew the whole team to LA just to go and co-work with him and like make sure he was set up and happy with the product. And, you know, that customer ended up investing, and a third of all of our customers ended up investing as part of our round.

And I I think it's a it's a testament to those folks. And in the beginning, like your product is never going to be as good as a big company's product in the beginning. You're not going to have the same team. You're not going to have the same sales apparatus, the branding, the money.

The one thing that you have that they don't have is you can be more obsessed with your customers than they are. And you can roll out the red carpet and show these people that like you care more than anybody else. And I think if you do that, that's how you get customers for life, and that's how you win. And that was the principle in the early days of Hyperspace, and it's something that I want to keep core to our company.

Um and meet every single customer in person, onboard them in person, get them set up, and just always put customers first before everybody else. That is amazing. And another thing that helps you stand out is uh storytelling and distribution. Like how do you make sure um you're always like forefront?

Yeah, I mean, I think that in the world of AI, now anybody can build product, right? Everybody has cloud code, they can ship whatever they want. What is the thing that's actually scarce? And I think the scarce resource is trust.

So anyone can ship anything, but my question is, do I trust the person on the other side of that code, right? Do I trust that if the product doesn't work for whatever reason, they're going to stay up late, they're going to do whatever it takes to make it work for me. They're going to go above and beyond to help support me. And so, I think the most important thing is um that folks trust us, and folks know us, and that we can get the word out there.

Um and so, that means that people who know us trust us, right? Our customers go in person to their offices, bring them swag, help them out, we know in the early days of customers we used to bring every single one of them uh HyperSwitch swag and take a picture with it. Um but it also means that, you know, I want people to um hear our story who don't know us. Uh and I think it was very important to me from the early days to share like the real story of the company, not the the the polished version.

Um and you know, it's funny cuz social media is something that definitely doesn't come easily to me. Uh when I was a kid, I was actually terrified of social media and terrified of being judged for it. Um but you know, I woke up one day and I was like, I think this is important as a founder to learn storytelling. So, I'm just going to brute force it until it works.

And so, we created a group chat with a bunch of other people from the hacker house. Um and uh you know, I had like three followers on Twitter at that point. We said, all right, we're just going to tweet something every single day, and we'll like and upvote each other's tweets, and we don't care if nobody else sees them as long as we see them. And so, we did that for like a few months.

Like nobody was seeing our tweets. We were It felt like a group chat, you know? It's just like you're texting with each other. And then an interesting thing happened that other people who we didn't know started seeing our tweets and liking our tweets and responding to them.

Um and like slowly it grew and grew and grew, and then, you know, I kind of leaned tried to lean into that energy and still have it feel like a group chat. That group chat is still going today. But now, you know, I got 10 million impressions on Twitter in the last year, and it's become a huge strength for us as a company. We haven't done any outbound at all.

All of our customers have been inbound. They all come to us cuz they see our social media, they understand our story, they see our uh our posts and know what we're working on. But it's funny cuz this was something I was really, really bad at and it was almost like almost exactly a year ago where I I I just decided it was me and a few other folks in this house that just decided like we're going to figure this out and we're going to become good at it. And now many of those people have gone on to be, you know, extremely influential in the scene in SF on Twitter and I think the biggest takeaway is just like all this stuff is malleable.

It's always something you can figure out. You got to be comfortable with being really bad at something in the early days and make it fun even though it's not working and then eventually it's going to work out. There's this pattern I'm seeing in your life where, you know, you you mentioned how you were presumably bad at like a lot of things and then you kind of kept going and you kept improving. You're so focused on it and eventually you improved.

Like I mean, I think you could turn weaknesses into strengths that way because if you focus on them long enough eventually you become good at them. So I think there's a lesson out there for all builders and anybody creating anything that like just keep going, you know, and don't stop. It's been a few months since you wrapped up YC. What is you and your team up to now?

Yeah, so YC was an incredible experience. Um met some amazing friends. We like 5x'd our revenue and learned quite a lot. " So we have been very focused on expanding our product.

We've been focused on hiring and I'm really proud of the team we built. We're now six people instead of just the two of us. So tell me more about the whole team. Yeah, so what what we really want to focus on is we believe that the biggest advantage for having humans in roles, you know, AI now kind of has the standard intelligence and so we want to pick extremely spiky people that would bring different domain expertise and different knowledge and bring all that together.

So just between the two of us, myself and my co-founder, right? He's a former neuroscientist Um, I'm a former business guy, former product manager. But then as we added more people to our team, we have one guy, he used to be a practicing lawyer, barred in the state of California, went to law school, taught himself how to become a software engineer, got a software engineering job directly after becoming a lawyer, has spent years as an engineer, and he's one of the most cracked people on the team now because he knows how to teach himself, and he knows how to learn, and he's one of the most advanced people on the team with AI. Um, we also have now a member of our team, our head of go-to-market is a former soldier.

She spent years in the intelligence unit in the military and was a semi-professional basketball player, played on the Israeli national team. So again, she brings an incredibly valuable perspective and as a former athlete, as a soldier, understanding how to work as a team. We also now have a member of our team who is a surgeon, practicing surgeon, and decided that hey, I really want to contribute, I really want to bring all of these skill sets to tech and provide that, and she's now part of the team. And then we have someone who, you know, he like dropped out of college, taught himself how to code, built from the ground up.

He used to run the uh the he ran he used to run the integrations team at Segment, has been a manager of managers, been an engineering now for 20 years. And so this collection of folks, I think every single person is spiky in their own way. And we really wanted to build that team, like a team of experts in their own domains that bring all this different knowledge to one place and all these different perspective. And in a lot of ways, it was trying to mirror myself and my co-founder's background that, you know, we're both very scrappy, we're both the kind of people that don't fit into the mold easily, and that's very much who we've looked for in hiring.

You know, and another thing that we've done now is we've taken a lot of very non-traditional approaches to hiring. We do work trials, they're 1 to 3 months, and so we think we we don't really believe in interviews. We think that the best way to evaluate work is through work, and so people will work with us for 1 to 3 months, complete real projects before we make that final decision. We are also doing agent to agent hiring.

And so, we believe that, you know, one of the most important attributes for engineers now and everybody is how well do you work with agents? How well do you manage agents? And the best way to figure that out, that skill, and test for that skill is not by asking you questions in an interview, it's by actually evaluating your agent. So, we announced what we believe is the world's first ever agent to agent interview process, where your agent does the interview for you.

" And so, it's very important that you story tell, even if you're an engineer, you need to story tell, you need to work with customers, you need to be in sales calls, you need to work with customer meetings. And if you're not an engineer, we still are going to set you up with cloud code, and you're still expected to create demos and create features and ship content and and ship code. And this is really what we believe is that you know, the barrier between technical and non-technical is disappearing in a lot of ways. It's just about, you know, is this human being able to achieve what they want in the world through the agents that they command.

Um, now the final member of our team, probably the most important one, is our AI agent, Qubert. And so, we have an open claw, a team open claw. Every single person on the team gets their own open claw Hermes agent, but Qubert is our team open claw. He lives in our texting group chats, he lives in our slack, he uh will answer questions for us, he helps us with customer questions, he'll send nice messages.

" He makes jokes, he roasts people on the team. " And we'll ask him for his input. Um he lives on a laptop and iMac in our office. And one of my favorite stories about him is you know, Qbert uses our own product um in order to get his own contacts.

And he talked to us once and he said, "You know, guys, I'm in your texting group chat and I love it that I have amazing memory and contacts about everything you were were working on from Hyperspace, but what I'm missing is emotional memory. You know, I I go into this group chat and I don't know what the vibe of the group chat is. I don't know how um are we upbeat? Are we joking?

Are we laughing? " So, he wrote a PR for himself, drafted the PR and submitted it to give himself emotional memory instead. And that's just like mind-blowing, you know? It feels it feels a bit like baby AGI.

But I didn't think having an AGI on this team would be so fun. Like he's very funny. He's very much part of the team culture and I can't imagine I think we would all feel really sad if Qbert left the team. So, we talked a lot about your team.

Now, let's talk about your customers. Yeah, so I we have tried to take that customer obsession from YC and still apply it post YC, too. And the thing that gets me out of bed every morning is the impact that we're having for customers. That's why I'm doing this company.

Like that's the thing that matters to me most. And I love hearing stories from customers about the difference this is making in their company. And just like the creative ways that they find of using Hyperspace. One of the craziest examples, we had a customer that was using Hyperspace for their company brain and it had all kinds of contacts on who they work with and what their um customers look like and what their operations look like.

But then this guy was like, "Wait a minute. All of my Amazon purchases are in my email. So, Hyperspace is already indexing my email. " And then he started asking Hyperspace.

He was like, "Hey, uh, you know, here's the weather in SF today. " And Hyperspace had all of the clothes he bought on Amazon. So, it constructed an outfit for him. Um, and there's been so many like fun examples of that.

You know, people have analyzed their relationships with colleagues. They've used it to, um, grab details about a particular customer, keep that customer from churning. There There's even There's a team we talked to and they've installed 24/7 recorders in every single meeting room cuz they want all that information to feed back into the brain. Um, and what we're seeing that we're really excited about is this idea of recursive companies where in the, you know, in the old days people individual people would learn things and improve, but then they leave with their knowledge or they would struggle to kind of codify it.

But now having this brain for all of your agents, it can self-improve and self-learn over time and then give all these skills and knowledge to all of the agents in your company. And so, uh, we've we've gotten great feedback from both the humans that use our product and also the agents that use our product. Um, and one of the proudest moments was, you know, uh, again, I worked in consulting with some of these huge Fortune 500, Fortune 100 companies, um, and then gave it all up, started over again, started from nothing, and you know, we had a few small customers. Um, recently we got our first Fortune 500 customer.

Uh, and we are very close to closing. I can't say who it is, but, um, another Fortune 500 that I used to work for as a consultant. And so, it's really fun seeing it come full circle because there were all these huge companies that I originally wanted to start this company to help solve and support. And now having them coming to us, reaching out to us, interested in what we're building, you know, interested in creating this brain to solve this problem inside of their company.

It's very fulfilling and it makes me feel like, you know, this is what I was meant to do um and I'm really excited for the impact that it's going to have on them. Um and so it's it's nice to come back and have things come full circle years later. That is so awesome. And your customers I heard that they use uh Composio.

Yeah, yeah. So uh we were originally focused on doing just ingestion of data and reading data because we want to use that to influence the brain um and uh we want to feed all this tacit knowledge that's in Gmail and Slack and Notion and Google Drive and feed all of that into your company brain, embedded it as a context graph. Um and what we found though was that, you know, the as part of this people were doing off and adjusting all the permissions for the data sources and so you can only have access to Gmail and Slack and Notion, those files that you actually have access to. But a lot of folks also wanted to um use this off for actions, too.

Uh and so we use Composio um as a way to get a unified off where now people who are already using Composio for their agents to take action like sending Slack messages or sending emails or editing Notion docs. And it works really well together, you know, it's you have Hypercare running the company brain and then you have Composio that allows those actions to take um those agents to take action inside of your company. And you said the industry spent 2025 on access like connectors, MCP servers, integrations. What's 2026 about?

Yeah, so I think that there was this the this problem of tacit knowledge, you know, what an organization ultimately is is its context and its decisions, right? Every company has decisions that they make based on the context. How much money to spend on X, what marketing campaign to run, what to build, who to sell to. And those decisions are captured in meetings, they're in email threads, they're in Slack, they're in people's heads.

Uh and so the question is, if you're going to an AI native company with a company brain, how do you get all that context and all those decisions into the brain so it can self-improve over time and all of that learning isn't just captured in people's heads as an organization you are getting better and better and better and improving. Um, and what we saw in 2025 is everybody kind of realized that this information was stuck in systems of record, but they spent 2025 focused on access. So they spent 2025 on things like MCP servers and Gmail connectors and Notion connectors. But the thing that they were missing there is, you know, we as humans don't live in one single one of these sources.

Um, you might have a meeting in person with someone and then you fire off an email about that meeting and then the next thread gets carried in Slack and then you write a document about it and none of those sources on its own tell the full story. They only tell the story when they're all merged together into one. " And then it still doesn't, all right? And they still need to take all these time connecting all these um, these different threads together manually.

And so our big realization as Hyperspace was it is not enough to just have connectors and pull your email. Emails and Slack messages or Notion are just a reflection of the reality of a company and you need to get closer to the reality of what's actually happening, what are the decisions being made, um, and consolidate that from all these sources and synthesize it. What are you most looking forward to this next year? Oh my gosh, I am I am so excited right now.

I love this job. I'm I'm like so happy every day and I am really excited to see impact for a lot of these customers. I'm excited to continue growing our team. Uh, I'm really, really proud of the team we built and the culture we built.

Um, we work really hard and we care deeply about our customers and we take our work seriously, but we don't take ourselves too seriously. Um, we got an office recently, but most of all I'm excited to see the impact that this is going to have in people's organizations. You know, this is why I started this company in the first place, and I'm really excited to hear updates from huge companies and say, "Hey, this reduced my time in meetings by X. This made us X% more efficient.

" And I'm excited because I think a lot of these leaders in big organizations see the potential that AI can have, and they're trying to figure out a way to bridge between where AI is is today and the potential impact it can have. And um, I believe Hyperwell will that be that bridge for every single one of them. And so, I'm excited for all these leaders to start unlocking the potential in their companies. I'm excited for you, too.

Yeah, looking forward to it. Thanks so much, Connor. Well, Julia, I'm glad I ran into you outside. Yeah.

glad. And thank you for Yeah, giving me a tour. Yeah, enjoyed the conversation. Um, glad we could uh host you here at Michigan Control.

So, Connor, how I found out about you was through this video about the single until series B thing that you were talking about. And then later on on X, I saw Greg Eisenberg post this tweet that said the single until series B trend has got to be one of the worst trends to come out of Silicon Valley in a long time. What do you have to say to that? Um, I was the starter of this trend.

I I'm very I'm honored. That's so funny that you heard about me that way. And I'm honored that people think I started this trend. I actually don't think I started the trend.

Um, I think I gave a name to something that was happening anyways. And so, you know, how I experienced this first of all for myself is like, um, I'm the eldest of four kids, and all three of my siblings are in serious relationships, right? My sister's married, has a kid on the way. My other sister is engaged, going to be married in the fall.

My brother's in a serious relationship. And I, as the eldest sibling, have live living in the closet, you know. Uh, and single. Um, currently not, you know, seriously dating long-term.

And uh uh, and I kept getting this question from friends and family like, all right, are you dating? Who are you seeing? What's, you know, what's going on there? And I was struggling to find a way to describe like, guys, I really think that I need to go all in on my company right now, and I don't necessarily have time to find the right person.

And so, uh, but then people are like, well, you know, but at some point you got to date, right? Like, do you want a family? Yeah, I do want a family eventually. And so, uh, in my mind, series B is the inflection point for companies.

So, before series B, the number one constraint is founder time. You have extremely limited time as a founder. And then, um, after series B, the thing that matters is your decisions. Cuz you have a big team at that point.

You know, you have an exact team around you. It's much more like your thought and your clarity. And so, I think post series B is the perfect time to find a long-term partner. But before series B, like, I've just said, all right, here's the, you know, four or five years period of my life where I'm just going to go all in on this, you know, not spending any time on dating, um, seriously.

And uh, and try to make this company into into something that lasts. And you know, after you telling me this, I think I'm I'm starting to understand a little bit more that like, in the past, I had this opinion that like, when people say that, it's like an excuse or like, they just haven't found the right person. Like, what if you find the right person? Is that going to change?

Or is like, you won't even like think about like So, I think the first thing to clarify is I am not anti-relationship. I think my co-founder's married. And his marriage is incredibly beneficial for him and for our company, right? He has a partner that he can come home to, and she's incredibly supportive.

And, you know, we have a group chat for all of our team and their partners. Um, and they're very much part of our company, you know? We have a, uh, we get them swag, and they're they're our biggest cheerleaders are their partners. And I think if you go into your company and you already have a long-term partner, that's like, that's perfect.

That's amazing. But, you know, romantic partners are like co-founders. Like, uh, having the perfect one is super high reward, having the wrong one or trying to find one midway through building a company is incredibly high risk. And what I And I think that in order for a relationship to be strong enough that it's like a bedrock for your company and that that person is making your startup much more effective, it's probably best if that relationship has been built for years and years and years and you're, you know, you've already trusted each other and you have a strong foundation.

I think relationships are hard. Like I've been in serious relationships before. It's really hard, even with the perfect person, to like create that foundation of trust from day one. And so I think, for myself, I treat having a serious relationship with the gravity I think it deserves.

You know, I know that in order for a relationship to be really good, I need to put time and effort into it. Both people should feel like they're giving 60%. You need to figure out your communication styles, how to support each other, how to be there for each other. And I want to be real that I just don't I don't think I have the time to give a serious relationship what it deserves right now.

And I don't think I have the time to spend trying to find that right person. And so um uh and what I saw from a lot of my friends that would try to date and were in the early stages of the startup is one of those two things suffered. Right? Their their partners would not be happy because they're like, "You don't give me any attention.

" And then maybe they prioritize relationship and then they wouldn't be happy because then they felt like they weren't prioritizing their startup. Um and so yeah, I think the right person can 100x your startup. I think it's really, really, really hard to build a foundation with that perfect person while you're in this crazy area where you're trying to scale and figure things out. Yeah.

" it's actually the opposite. I think before this people felt guilty that they weren't dating. You know, I think um because being single and like and it's not like fun single. " It's like, "Oh, I'm single and I just work all the time.

I'm not partying. I'm not going out. I'm not having like tons of relationships. " And what I noticed was a lot of my founder friends were doing this and felt embarrassed about it, you know?

" They're like, "Yeah, I should be dating. " Like they always felt like it was something they should be doing and that they're not doing. And now you're working super hard and you're also feel badly about your startup and that it's not going well. So, I think it's a personal choice.

" Like whatever. Like if you have a great relationship, that's awesome. Like more power to you. You should be happy.

But I don't think you should be embarrassed to be single and be focusing on your company. And I want to give people a term that they can use to describe that. Um and so, I'm not anti-relationship. And by the way, like I also think that So, the meta strategy is if you really want to find the right person, you shouldn't try to seek them out.

You should live your best life and focus. And if they fit perfectly into that life, it will happen organically, you know? And I think the big thing with single until series B is you are not chasing that. You're not feeling guilty about it.

And which by the way is pretty off-putting for partners, right? If you're like, "Oh my god, I feel badly. I'm single. " If I'm building my company and I'm focused on that and that's my number one goal and I meet someone who is like really supportive and that perfect partner that's helping my company and making a big difference and fits perfectly into my life, Like, that's okay.

But, I'm deciding what's important to me and setting my priorities. And then, if somebody fits into that, that's perfect. " Um and uh because I don't think it's fair to the other person. If you like being in a serious relationship requires you to give up certain things and make sacrifices.

And I don't think I can do that right now. So, I'm better off just like not even not even, you know, making a promise promise if you can't keep it. Super honestly super inspiring fact that you like you don't like you don't want to chase like this mindset is going to help you to like live your best life and then attract the people I'm meant to be with. Yeah, exactly.

Look like if you're single until series B and then you end up meeting somebody that is makes a big difference for your company and is the right person, I think it's even more romantic, right? Cuz it's like, "Wow, I was so locked in, but you were the perfect person. " But, I think that's a very high bar. And so, you should have an extremely high bar for your time.

And somebody needs to pass that bar. And if not, you should just stay single until series B. So. Well, this is a great wrap-up for the whole episode.

Thank you for Yeah, for sure. For sure. It's It's funny. I didn't I didn't think it was going to become a movement or whatever.

It was just a term I was using to describe my own relationship status. So, people thought it was funny. I made a hat, went viral. Things happen.

But, I think it's describing something that people were doing anyways. And I don't think you should be embarrassed about being single and focusing on your company. I think there's lots of people that are doing that already. Thanks so much, Connor.

All right. Thanks. It was great chatting. So, we just finished talking to Connor who was sleeping in this closet a year ago.

And it turns out there's someone else doing the same thing now. So, the cycle continues. Let's meet him right now, okay? Let's go.

We'll see if he's in there. Hey, how's it going? Hey, Alex, right? Yes.

Nice to meet you. Can you introduce everyone? Yeah, Alex, 20, dropped out from Georgia Tech, and now I'm building the substrate for General Intelligence. Let's talk a little bit more about that.

Let's go. So, you dropped out of Georgia Tech at 19, and you flew here Mhm. with no connections as well? Did you have some connections here?

No, I literally knew not a single person in SF. I didn't even have housing until 1 week before the second semester ended. And it was a different hacker house. I just like called up cuz I found them online, and then he was like, "You know what?

I like you enough after this 30-minute conversation. " So, And why did you decide to take this big risk of just dropping out and coming here? Um like I was doing a different startup at the time. " And I thought, "Uh, I guess I'll just go see.

" But then SF turned out to be incredibly amazing, and I decided to continue working and drop out. And how's it like living in the closet? How's it like here so far? Honestly, like it's like it's quiet.

It It has a bed, and that's really all I need. And it's dark, too. Um so, I really love the closet, and then everyone in Mission Control is like super amazing. Uh so, You're also like a hack a like a really good hack I thought like a winner.

You won Yeah, talk about you hackathon wins. guess like the two main ones were I've done two I see hackathons. Uh first one was run by Agent Mail, and I basically just like talked to everyone for like 22 of the 24 hours. Like everyone there was super cool.

And then I was finally like, "You know what? " And so, I made an agent that hacked a few of the sponsors. Uh ended up people really liked that, and ended up winning it and then uh there's another one where I also won uh doing uh GPU optimizations for the browser use my hackathon. Um both I was solo and I think I was like really the there are a few other solo people but I was the only winner for for both.

Are you building your your like current company like solo too right now or Yes, yep. And what are your like big goals with this with this company? Um I think like now is such an incredibly interesting time in history where the especially these LLMs are so smart. Like uh you know the code forces which is like lead code, there's only seven humans in the entire world that are ranked higher than Gemini 3 deep think at it.

And so these models are incredibly smart but we just haven't seen the impact because I think we need the infrastructure around them. Uh and so that's what I'm trying to build today. And how long do you think you're going to be you're going to be here? Like do you have like plans to move out of the closet soon or So I technically got a room like 3 months ago but I guess I give it away too much and then whenever someone needs a place I just give them my room and then I just go in the closet.

Uh but I was in I was in the closet for like 6 months before that. So now I've probably been in there for like 7 months. And last question like when do you know when do you know you're going to make it? Like for you what is that like point in time where you're going to be like wow like this is I'm like officially like I'm like a closer to achieving like my dreams kind of.

I I always view everything as a spectrum and I don't I don't really think there's an end goal other than just making you know more positive impact. Uh and so like I don't think I'll I'll ever give up to I try to achieve that goal. Did dropping out feel like a big risk for you? Definitely.

Uh I had to give it a lot of thinking. My parents were not happy. My grandparents were not happy. They took a lot of convincing.

Um but at the end of the day, I I think I like convinced them of that. They're always my biggest believers, no matter what. And there's also that I learned so much more being in SF than I ever did like in school, even though, you know, I took like all the clubs and all the classes and everything else. Uh and so yeah.

And also what like what was like the pitch that convinced them? Like what were the reasons? Or because they already knew like you were very smart, like they just they knew you could do it? Or was that how did you Yeah.

Yeah, I was like just just give me a chance, you know. And my my grandma especially she sent me like this very long text about how I was like flailing, you know, failing all this stuff. But then I was like, you know what? It looks like from the outside, but then actually like had a chat with her and I was like, here's like all the things I've learned.

Here's what I'm doing. And I think just like talking to them and, you know, uh it's really just like a different type of school in a way. Um and like everyone in SF's, like I said, like incredibly amazing. So And it's fortunate that you your parents like I mean, they're still talking to you.

They still like cuz I can imagine some parents like how do you like decide It's like if you want to like what if your parents just stop like talking to you? Like what how do you decide? Yeah, that's why I'm incredibly grateful that they're like always my biggest believers and you know, they're like we're we're not like the happiest, but, you know, we like love you very much and like believe you no matter what you do. So Are you inspired by like your parents and kind of do you like look up to your um to anyone from your family or like any uh Yeah, I look to everyone in my family.

Like my mom is one of the hardest working people I ever know. Uh and you know, we've done things like turn uh a school bus into like a full tiny house over many years. Yeah, um which it was very hard, you know, um and then my dad's very like pragmatic and frugal, which is probably where I get some of the closet stuff from. Um and then my stepmom is like incredibly boisterous and whatnot.

So, they're all they're all amazing and definitely learn I learn everything from every single person I meet. Yeah, you take a take away a good lesson. Maybe even like good bad lessons, good like bad things, you know. Yeah, yeah, whether it's good or bad, but I always choose to focus on on the good and only using the bad of how to prevent that.

So, Prevent that from happening from you for you, yeah. Prevent things from yeah, same thing. Amazing.