Three years ago, two Harvard dropouts set out to build a better AI chip than the largest companies in the world.
Almost everyone I called at the time said it was impossible.
Today, Etched (@Etched) comes out of stealth with $800M total raised, $1B in signed customer contracts, and a working next-gen AI chip.
This was my excuse to ask the two founders, @UbertiGavin and @robertwachen, every question I have about compute and inference.
We discuss:
- Why they built an entire rack and not just a chip
- The two technical bets behind their architecture no one else has tried
- How two founders in their twenties recruited industry legends
- The night they nearly ran out of money
- Why whoever produces the most tokens wins
If you care about the future of compute, Gavin and Rob are two people to know. I think you will find the story of what they have built hard to forget.
Enjoy!
TIMESTAMPS
0:00 Intro
1:00 Why Nobody Believed Etched Would Work
14:06 Why Inference Is the Bottleneck
22:27 Gavin and Rob’s Origin Stories
33:24 Taking Huge Risks to Move Faster
49:43 Kernels, Compilers, and the AI Stack
1:02:08 Raising $100M to Survive
1:16:00 The Future of Models, Agents, and Intelligence