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How is AI Different Than Other Technology Waves? (With Bret Taylor and Clay Bavor)

ACQ2 Episode

August 18, 2025
August 18, 2025

Is AI just better software? Or something completely different that requires a new paradigm to understand? Today we sit down with Bret Taylor and Clay Bavor, two of the best product builders in the world to tackle that question. Bret and Clay are the co-founders of the AI company Sierra.

Brett's resume reads like a greatest hits of Silicon Valley: co-creator of Google Maps, founder of FriendFeed (acquired by Facebook where he became CTO), founder of Quip (acquired by Salesforce where he became co-CEO), former Chairman of the Board at Twitter, and current Chairman of the Board at OpenAI. Clay spent 18+ years at Google, starting as an APM alongside Brett and eventually running product for Gmail, Drive, Docs (all of Google Workspace), Google Labs, and the company's AR/VR efforts.

In addition to AI, today’s conversation has some great tech industry history discussion and old Google stories, perfect to tide us all over between Google Part I and Part II!

Additional Topics:

  • The accelerating adoption curves of technology waves, and if we’ll ever see an app that gets a billion users in one day
  • Second- and third-order effects of agents on the internet economy and customer experience
  • Making predictions on which AI terminology will stick and what won’t
  • New pricing models in the era of AI, like “outcome-based pricing”
  • What it’s like to build teams in this new AI era

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Transcript: (disclaimer: may contain unintentionally confusing, inaccurate and/or amusing transcription errors)

Transcript coming later this week.

Note: Acquired hosts and guests may hold assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. You should do your own research and make your own independent decisions when considering any financial transactions.

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