What Gives an AI Founder Staying Power I James Theuerkauf, CEO of Syrup Tech I Sara Ittelson, Partner at Accel

It's really, really hard to ask a SaaS UI to tell you why is the model understanding this pattern or that pattern, but an LLM can do that.

You really don't want someone who is in love with the implementation or in love with the specifics of the technology because the reality is some pieces of it they're going to have to just throw out outright, right?

It's hard, but it's also mesmerizingly rewarding.

This is High Agency, the podcast for AI builders.

I'm Reza Habib.

All right, so I'm delighted today to be joined by Sarah Idelson and James Toyokauf for a Double Bill special episode.

Sarah is a partner at Accel where she's an investor, but she's also an ex-operator.

And she sits on the board of a lot of different AI startups like Assembly AI and Syrup, where James is the CEO and co-founder.

And she's also witnessed hyper-growth companies firsthand at Uber and then at FAIR.

So I think she'll be able to give us a perspective on what's going on in the AI ecosystem as a whole, as well as the economic impact.

And then James is the CEO and founder of Syrup Tech, one of Sarah's portfolio companies.

And he's going to help us dive into the details and the weeds of building an AI-first company.

So thanks both for joining us.

So James, I thought a nice place to start would be for the audience just to explain what Syrup Tech is and what you guys build.

So the website, you describe yourselves as an AI-powered decision support tool for merchandising teams, which is a bit of a mouthful.

Help me break that down for someone who doesn't know.

What are you guys actually building?