Berkeley Innovation Podcast

Episode #14

This episode features Michael Seibel from Y-Combinator (YC) sharing about Product Market Fit when he was on campus for the "Decode Silicon Valley Startup Success" DeCal class offered by the Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology (SCET) at UC Berkeley.

Episode #13

In this "Tech Uncovered" episode, take a journey with a group of current Berkeley students as they explore how they should be thinking about launching a startup based on their class project. They chat with a fellow student startup founder, a venture capitalist, and a congressional aid about their AI facial recognition project. 

Episode #11 Faculty Insight Interview with Ken Sandy. Ken is technology Product Management veteran. He's and SCET Industry Fellow and teaches the first Product Management course offered in Berkeley Engineering, with over 400 PM alumni. In the episode we learn about Ken's PM journey, teaching at Berkeley and his new book; “The Influential Product Manager – How to Lead and Launch Successful Technology Products.” It's a highly practical and approachable guide to becoming more effective and navigating the challenging collaborative aspects of the product manager’s role. 01:58 - Born in Australia 02:41 - Engineering 05:28 - San Francisco 06:16 - McKinsey & Co. 07:22 - Transition to Startup 17:41 - Empathy as a PM 21:44 - Being a Product Manager 24:14 - Teaching at Berkeley 31:26 - Book "The Influential Product Manager" 39:56 - Mindsets of a PM 45:16 - 5 Questions to Understanding Customers 52:35 - Steve Jobs the PM 56:13 - Engineering Collaboration 58:23 - Fun

Episode #12

Global Perspectives episode featuring a group of current BerkeleyGlobal entrepreneurship students chatting with Berkeley alumnae Rachel Williams. She is the head of Head of Equity, Inclusion & Diversity Talent Acquisition at X The Moonshot Factory at Google Alphabet. 

Rachel shares with the group of students her unique perspective about inclusion, culture, and leadership... she even has some fun digging into real world situations so you hear how leaders on the front line of today’s firms think.

02:41 - Background

04:05 - About X

07:10 - On Diversity

08:25 - On Inclusion

10:20 - Employees being authentic selves

12:01 - Humility

12:58 - Hiring process

16:39 - Leading your first team

19:45 - Tricky situations

33:36 - Fast & Curious

37:40 - Character

40:51 - Academic background in hiring

42:49 - On culture

48:30 - In time of crisis - People first

50:49 - Who creates culture

53:57 - Culture insights

56:20 - Final thoughts and advice

Episode #10

Foundercast episode featuring Ofek Arush and George Passantino, cofounders of Quokka Brew. Hear how George and Ofek launched their startup, from coming up with the idea, naming, to launching the business. 

00:19 - Introduction

01:45 - Childhood friends

02:15 - Their first business

02:43 - Entrepreneurial spirit

03:38 - The muffin men

06:07 - Berkeley

07:20 - How Quokka Brew was born

08:38 - Ready to drinks

11:44 - Research

14:11 - The breakthrough

18:34 - The Quokka name

21:17 - Traction

23:50 - Team of ambassadors 

27:37 - Where to get Quokka Brew

32:45 - Fun

 

Episode #9 This Student Stories episode features Alec Willerman, a BerkeleyHaas senior who was recently recognized as Best Course Coordinator in SCET classes during the Fall 2019. In the episode, Alec shares his journey, what he wants to do in the future, and his experience as a course coordinator.   00:36 - Introduction 01:37 - Winning the Best Course Coordinator Award 02:11 - Facilitation Skills 05:46 - Getting to Berkeley 06:34 - Education & Grading 08:09 - Facilitating learning 09:17 - Path to being a course coordinator 14:53 - A Curious Kid 15:20 - The troublemaker 17:29 - Business has a bad rap 20:15 - Transformational experiences on campus 23:31 - Fun

Episode #8

Foundercast Episode featuring Expensify Founder & CEO David Barrett. During his talk on campus at the Newton Lecture Series, Barrett shares his core philosophy of identifying the biggest problem you can, then go to work immediately to solve it. Take a listen!

00:56 - Introduction

03:56 - All the experts are wrong

05:47 - Don't trust me. Don't trust the VCs

06:39 - The CEOs are going to lie to you

07:56 - Everyone's going to fight for you

09:10 - Have you tried to change the world?

12:37 - Good ideas have to sound bad

16:02 - Traveling the world with a knapsack

19:50 - How Expensify started

23:57 - Q&A

Episode #7

This Newton Series Classic Episode features Marissa Mayer talking on campus when she was still VP of Search Products and User Experience at Google. She shares her journey to Google and some of the exciting things she was working on at the time. Mayer would go on to become CEO of Yahoo. 

Episode #6 In this Foundercast episode, DoorDash Co-Founder & CEO Tony Xu has a fireside chat with Vicky Howell during our SCET Newton Lecture series in the Fall of 2018. Tony shares his journey from student at Berkeley to starting DoorDash, along with thoughts on cofounder strengths, keys to validate his business, and more. DoorDash is the restaurant industry’s “last-mile” solution and has grown into a more than $4 billion leader in the on-demand space. Today, the company is also focusing efforts on an issue particularly important to Xu, using that same logistical expertise to reduce food waste with the recent launch of Project DASH. In just five years, DoorDash has become the industry standard for restaurant delivery, and recently expanded to grocery through its newest partnership with Walmart. 00:55 - Tony introduction 03:17 - Growing up in Illinois 05:49 - Family immigrant story 06:57 - Major at Berkeley 07:42 - On entrepreneurship 09:27 - Keeping sane in school 11:38 - Going to McKinsey 14:41 - Business School 18:42 - Soft skills 19:28 - What you can't fake 20:18 - DoorDash - what was not obvious 24:38 - Cofounders and backgrounds 21:23 - The first city 29:21 - Competition 31:22 - Stickler for detail 35:19 - Delivering good 39:10 - Q&A

Episode #5

This Alumni Achiever episode features a Berkeley Engineering Leader Panel recorded March 21, 2017 as part of the Newton Lecture Series. The discussion is moderated by Amit Kumar, Partner at VC form Accel and  features Padmini Pyapali of Uber, Jeff Huang of Facebook, and Sanjay Jeyakumar of Twitter.

01:04 - Panel introduction

03:29 - Berkeley experience

10:11 - Microsoft to Facebook considerations

13:37 - Zynga to Uber considerations

17:07 - Oracle to Google to startup to Twitter

19:20 - Startup terrified

20:54 - Navigating internals of a company

24:30 - Getting into management

27:55 - Tech architect path

34:01 - Getting acquired by Twitter

35:54 - Working at a lightning rod company

40:27 - Advice for students

45:36 - Q&A

Episode #4

Newton Series Classic episode featuring renowned Entrepreneur and Venture Capitalist Ben Horowitz. Andreessen Horowitz Co-Founder Ben Horowitz gave this Newton Lecture Series talk on campus at Berkeley on November 3rd, 2009, just four months after starting his new venture firm. In this episode, he shares his entrepreneurial journey, along with what his new firm was looking for in terms of entrepreneurs and companies in which to invest. 

00:30 - Episode Introduction

01:30 - Ben Horowitz introduction

02:40 - How to play Quarterback in the NFL

04:10 - Controversial Computer Science degree 

05:35 - Are you studying the right thing?

06:07 - The hilarious Warren Buffett

07:03 - Words of wisdom from the King of Pop, Michael Jackson

09:05 - What you need to build a new technology company

10:45 - Apple's Steve Jobs

14:17 - Story of Bernard Hopkins

15:10 - The second thing you need to build a new technology company

16:39 - How I became a CEO

20:30 - Story of America Online (AOL) to Loudcloud to Opsware 

27:49 - Bill Clinton & Lesson from Colin Powell

29:10 - Is it too late to start a tech company?

33:12 - How can someone from Harvard write something so stupid?

35:12 - Would you like to know why smart people are so stupid?

39:34 - All the value in tech companies & who VCs want to invest in

41:48 - Quality of the team

42:40 - Megalomaniacs

43:59 - Great opportunities

45:31 - The biggest challenge for entrepreneurs

46:43 - Even William from Twitter and Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook

48:02 - The biggest thing to building a company

Episode #3

Faculty Insight conversation with Alexander Fred-Ojala on Blockchain, Data Science, and AI. Alex is an International Instructor from Sweden who is the former Research Director of the SCET Data Lab and co-Founder of the SCET Blockchain Lab. He helped create the DataX Framework and our popular DataX course.   

00:49 - Introduction  of Alex

03:00 - What's exciting in SCET Blockchain Challenge Lab

03:59 - Blockchain Use Cases

04:29 - Blockchain's Killer Application

06:05 - Commercial Application of Blockchain - Walmart & IBM Case

08:25 - Blockchain Scalability Issues

09:45 - Pruning the Merkle Tree

10:55 - What's exciting in SCET Data Lab

11:20 - Revolutionizing Global Telecommunications Network

13:21 - Natural Language Processing & Understanding 

15:19 - Contextual Understanding, Dude!

16:32 - Next big technology opportunity for entrepreneurs

17:22 - Destroying businesses

18:24 - ICO Scams

19:56 - Monetization paths for Blockchain startups

21:25 - Value layer versus ledger

22:06 - The Web 3.0 - We own our data

23:15 - What we have in blockchain now that we didn't have in the past

24:29 - Doubts of blockchain

25:25 - The tipping point of blockchain - Angry Birds

27:15 - Decentralized applications

28:43 - Trust in blockchain, cryptocurrency, and money

32:05 - Adoption inflection point 

35:31 - Blockchain alternatives

36:51 - Satoshi Nakamoto & blockchain precursors

38:19 - Work shifts with AI 

41:10 - Value transition

44:03 - What should students do on campus

44:50 - Programs for professionals

46:29 - Fun!