Shows
Tech on the RocksNavigating the Future of AI and Data Infrastructure with BauplanSummaryIn this conversation, the founders of Bauplan, Jacopo and Ciro, share their extensive backgrounds in AI and data infrastructure, discussing the evolution of NLP and the challenges faced in the industry. They highlight the importance of data pipelines in AI effectiveness and the complexities of building data infrastructure. The discussion also covers lessons learned from previous ventures, the shifting dynamics of the AI market, and the need for collaboration between data scientists and engineers. They emphasize the significance of simplicity in data tools and the future of data management focusing on standardization and accessibility.
2025-09-0858 minTech on the RocksEmail as a Knowledge Graph: Micro CEO Brett on Rebuilding CRM at the InboxSummaryBrett — founder & CEO of Micro — joins Nitay and Kostas to share how he’s turning email into a knowledge graph and rebuilding CRM right inside the inbox. He traces a path from Google’s M&A and Allo product team to Clearbit and Launch House, then digs into why most “inbox zero” workflows fail, how interoperability and AI agents shift power to the interface, and what it takes to design an email experience people actually live in.What you’ll learnWhy email is a system of record—and how Micro converts t...
2025-08-181h 01Tech on the RocksCommunity, Compilers & the Rust Story with Steve KlabnikSummarySteve Klabnik has spent the last 15 years shaping how developers write code—from teaching Ruby on Rails to stewarding Rust’s explosive growth. In this wide-ranging conversation, Steve joins Kostas and Nitay to unpack the forces behind Rust’s rise and the blueprint for developer-first tooling.From Rails to Rust: How a web-framework luminary fell for a brand-new systems language and helped turn it into today’s go-to for memory-safe, zero-cost abstractions.Community as UX: The inside story of Cargo, humane compiler errors, and why welcoming IRC channels can matter more than benchmarks.Standards vs. Shipping...
2025-07-2859 min
Very True by VerissimoEngineering Architecture & Scaling Teams - It's All About Everything Series🎧 New on the Podcast: The Evolving Role of a CTOThis episode dives deep into how the CTO role evolves—from early-stage coding to scaling teams, making strategic decisions, and integrating AI without losing your technical edge.Featuring:Michael Stoppelman, Former SVP Engineering at YelpGustav Rydstedt, Chief Architect at Chegg, former CTO & Co-founder of VerblingModerated by Nitay Joffe, CTO & Co-founder of ActionIQ, Partner at Verissimo Ventures💡 Key themes explored:Staying hands-on as a technical leaderBuilding process without bureaucracyLeading with both conviction and emotional intelligenceEmbracing AI while maintaining core engineering skills
2025-07-0259 minTech on the RocksHow Cloudflare Reinvents Serverless at Global Scale with Josh HowardSummaryJosh Howard, Senior Engineering Manager at Cloudflare, joins Kostas and Nitay to discuss Cloudflare's innovative serverless platform, Durable Objects, and Workers. Learn how Cloudflare enables developers to build stateful applications with global scale, consistency, and simplicity at the network edge.Chapters00:00 Introduction and Background02:01 Journey into Storage Systems04:24 Cloudflare's Evolution and Developer Platform06:29 Understanding Durable Objects08:57 Durable Objects in Modern App Development11:18 Use Cases for Cloudflare's Developer Platform13:36 Building Agents and Real-Time Applications16:19 Developer Experience and Migration Strategies25:09 Exploring Workflow Systems: OLAP v...
2025-06-0552 minTech on the RocksBusiness Physics: How Brand, Pricing, and Product Design Define Success with Erik SwanSummaryIn this episode, Erik reflects on his long and storied tech career—from the days of punch cards to founding multiple startups, including a stint at Splunk. At 61, he offers a unique perspective on how the industry has evolved and shares candid insights into what it takes to build a successful company. He discusses the evolution from building simple tools to creating comprehensive solutions and eventually platforms, emphasizing the importance of starting with a “hammer”—a focused, simple tool—before scaling to a broader offering. Eril introduces his concept of the “physics of business,” a...
2025-05-081h 01Tech on the RocksIncremental Materialization: Reinventing Database Views with Gilad Kleinman of EpsioSummaryIn this episode, Gilad Kleinman, co-founder of Epsio, shares his unique journey from PHP development to low-level kernel programming and how that evolution led him to build an innovative incremental views engine. Gilad explains that Epsio tackles a common challenge in databases: making heavy, complex queries faster and more efficient through incremental materialization. He describes how traditional materialized views fall short—often requiring full refreshes—and how Epsio seamlessly integrates with existing databases by consuming replication streams (CDC) and writing back to result tables without disrupting the core transactional system. The...
2025-04-2452 minTech on the RocksFrom Data Mesh to Lake House: Revolutionizing Metadata with LakekeeperSummaryIn this episode, Viktor Kessler shares his journey and insights from his extensive experience in data management—from building risk management systems and data warehouses to working as a solutions architect at MongoDB and Dremio, and now co-founding a startup.Initially exploring data mesh concepts, Viktor explains how real-world challenges—such as the disconnect between technical data models and business needs, inconsistent definitions across departments, and the difficulty in managing actionable metadata—led him and his co-founder to pivot toward building a lake house solution. His startup is developing Lakekeeper, an open source...
2025-03-2157 minTech on the RocksReinventing Stream Processing: From LinkedIn to Responsive with Apurva MehtaSummaryIn this episode, Apurva Mehta, co-founder and CEO of Responsive, recounts his extensive journey in stream processing—from his early work at LinkedIn and Confluent to his current venture at Responsive. He explains how stream processing evolved from simple event ingestion and graph indexing to powering complex, stateful applications such as search indexing, inventory management, and trade settlement. Apurva clarifies the often-misunderstood concept of “real time,” arguing that low latency (often in the one- to two-second range) is more accurate for many applications than the instantaneous response many assume. He del...
2025-03-0658 minTech on the RocksSemantic Layers: The Missing Link Between AI and Data with David Jayatillake from CubeIn this episode, we chat with David Jayatillake, VP of AI at Cube, about semantic layers and their crucial role in making AI work reliably with data. We explore how semantic layers act as a bridge between raw data and business meaning, and why they're more practical than pure knowledge graphs. David shares insights from his experience at Delphi Labs, where they achieved 100% accuracy in natural language data queries by combining semantic layers with AI, compared to just 16% accuracy with direct text-to-SQL approaches. We discuss the challenges of building and maintaining semantic layers, the...
2025-02-2059 minTech on the RocksFrom black holes to AI in mathematics: AI Innovation in Mathematics and Health with Yaron HadadIn this episode, we chat with Yaron Hadad, a fascinating individual who transitioned from theoretical physics to entrepreneurship. We explore his groundbreaking work on black holes and gravitational waves, and learn about the Ramanujan Machine - an algorithmic system he helped develop that discovers new mathematical formulas and democratizes mathematical research. We'll hear about the scientific community's mixed reactions to this innovative approach. The conversation then shifts to his work with Neutrino, a company he founded that uses AI and continuous monitoring devices to understand how food affects individual health. We delve into the complexities...
2025-02-0459 minTech on the RocksBuilding a Native Search Engine in PostgreSQL: ParadeDB's Journey to Replace Elasticsearch with Philippe NoëlIn this episode, we chat with Philippe Noël, founder of ParadeDB, about building an Elasticsearch alternative natively on PostgreSQL. We explore the challenges and benefits of extending PostgreSQL versus building a separate system, diving into topics like full-text search, faceted analytics, and why organizations need these capabilities. We discuss the emerging bring-your-own-cloud deployment model, the state of the PostgreSQL extension ecosystem, and what makes a truly production-ready database extension. Philippe shares insights on the future of search technology and how recent AI developments are actually increasing the demand for traditional search capabilities. ...
2025-01-161h 00Tech on the RocksOptimizing SQL with LLMs: Building Verified AI Systems at Espresso AI with Ben LernerIn this episode, we chat with Ben, founder of Espresso AI, about his journey from building Excel Python integrations to optimizing data warehouse compute costs. We explore his experience at companies like Uber and Google, where he worked on everything from distributed systems to ML and storage infrastructure. We learn about the evolution of his latest venture, which started as a C++ compiler optimization project and transformed into a system for optimizing Snowflake workloads using ML. Ben shares insights about applying LLMs to SQL optimization, the challenges of verified code transformation, and the imp...
2025-01-031h 06Tech on the RocksSecurity as Code: Building Developer-First Security Tools with David MyttonIn this episode, we chat with David Mytton, founder and CEO of Arcjet and creator of console.dev. We explore his journey from building a cloud monitoring startup to founding a security-as-code company. David shares fascinating insights about bot detection, the challenges of securing modern applications, and why traditional security approaches often fail to meet developers' needs. We discuss the innovative use of WebAssembly for high-performance security checks, the importance of developer experience in security tools, and the delicate balance between security and latency. The conversation also covers his work on environmental technology and...
2024-12-191h 03Tech on the RocksDev Environments in the AI Era: Standardizing Development Infrastructure with Daytona's IvanIn this episode, we chat with Ivan, co-founder and CEO of Daytona, about the evolution of developer environments and tooling. We explore his journey from founding CodeAnywhere in 2009, one of the first browser-based IDEs, to creating the popular Shift developer conference, and now building Daytona's dev environment automation platform. We discuss the changing landscape of development environments, from local-only setups to today's complex hybrid configurations, and why managing these environments has become increasingly challenging. Ivan shares insights about open source business models, the distinction between users and buyers in dev tools, and what the future...
2024-12-041h 09Tech on the RocksEvolving Data Infrastructure for the AI Era: AWS, Meta, and Beyond with Roy Ben-AltaIn this episode, we chat with Roy Ben-Alta, co-founder of Oakminer AI and former director at Meta AI Research, about his fascinating journey through the evolution of data infrastructure and AI. We explore his early days at AWS when cloud adoption was still controversial, his experience building large language models at Meta, and the challenges of training and deploying AI systems at scale. Roy shares valuable insights about the future of data warehouses, the emergence of knowledge-centric systems, and the critical role of data engineering in AI. We'll also hear his practical advice on building AI companies today, including...
2024-11-211h 03Tech on the RocksFrom Functions to Full Applications: How Serverless Evolved Beyond AWS Lambda with Nitzan ShapiraIn this episode, we chat with Nitzan Shapira, co-founder and former CEO of Epsagon, which was acquired by Cisco in 2021. We explore Nitzan's journey from working in cybersecurity to building an observability platform for cloud applications, particularly focused on serverless architectures. We learn about the early days of serverless adoption, the challenges in making observability tools developer-friendly, and why distributed tracing was a key differentiator for Epsagon. We discuss the evolution of observability tools, the future impact of AI on both observability and software development, and the changing landscape of serverless computing. Finally, we hear Nitzan's current perspective on...
2024-11-0658 minTech on the RocksFrom GPU Compilers to architecting Kubernetes: A Conversation with Brian GrantFrom GPU computing pioneer to Kubernetes architect, Brian Grant takes us on a fascinating journey through his career at the forefront of systems engineering. In this episode, we explore his early work on GPU compilers in the pre-CUDA era, where he tackled unique challenges in high-performance computing when graphics cards weren't yet designed for general computation. Brian then shares insights from his time at Google, where he helped develop Borg and later became the original lead architect of Kubernetes. He explains key architectural decisions that shaped Kubernetes, from its extensible resource model to its approach to service discovery, and...
2024-10-221h 01Tech on the RocksProving Code Correctness: FizzBee and the Future of Formal Methods in Software Design with FizzBee's creator JPIn this episode, we chat with JP, creator of FizzBee, about formal methods and their application in software engineering. We explore the differences between coding and engineering, discussing how formal methods can improve system design and reliability. JP shares insights from his time at Google and explains why tools like FizzBee are crucial for distributed systems. We delve into the challenges of adopting formal methods in industry, the potential of FizzBee to make these techniques more accessible, and how it compares to other tools like TLA+. Finally, we discuss the future of software development, including the role of LLMs...
2024-10-081h 01Tech on the RocksMLOps Evolution: Data, Experiments, and AI with Dean Pleban from DagsHubIn this episode, we chat with Dean Pleban, CEO of DagsHub, about machine learning operations. We explore the differences between DevOps and MLOps, focusing on data management and experiment tracking. Dean shares insights on versioning various components in ML projects and discusses the importance of user experience in MLOps tools. We also touch on DagsHub's integration of AI in their product and Dean's vision for the future of AI and machine learning in industry.LinksDagsHubThe MLOps PodcastDean on LIChapters00:00 Introduction and Background03:03 Challenges of...
2024-09-2753 minTech on the RocksHow Denormalized is Building ‘DuckDB for Streaming’ with Apache DataFusionIn this episode, Kostas and Nitay are joined by Amey Chaugule and Matt Green, co-founders of Denormalized. They delve into how Denormalized is building an embedded stream processing engine—think “DuckDB for streaming”—to simplify real-time data workloads. Drawing from their extensive backgrounds at companies like Uber, Lyft, Stripe, and Coinbase. Amey and Matt discuss the challenges of existing stream processing systems like Spark, Flink, and Kafka. They explain how their approach leverages Apache DataFusion, to create a single-node solution that reduces the complexities inherent in distributed systems.The conversation explores topics such as develope...
2024-09-131h 02Tech on the RocksUnifying structured and unstructured data for AI: Rethinking ML infrastructure with Nikhil Simha and Varant ZanoyanIn this episode, we dive deep into the future of data infrastructure for AI and ML with Nikhil Simha and Varant Zanoyan, two seasoned engineers from Airbnb and Facebook. Nikhil and Varant share their journey from building real-time data systems and ML infrastructure at tech giants to launching their own venture.The conversation explores the intricacies of designing developer-friendly APIs, the complexities of handling both batch and streaming data, and the delicate balance between customer needs and product vision in a startup environment.Contacts & LinksNikhil SimhaVarant ZanoyanChronon project
2024-08-311h 01Tech on the RocksStream processing, LSMs and leaky abstractions with Chris RiccominiIn this episode, we chat with Chris Riccomini about the evolution of stream processing and the challenges in building applications on streaming systems. We also chat about leaky abstractions, good and bad API designs, what Chris loves and hates about Rust and finally about his exciting new project that involves object storage and LSMs. Connect with Chris at:LinkedInXBlogMaterialized View Newsletter - His newsletterThe missing README - His bookSlateDB - His latest OSS ProjectChapters00:00 Introduction and Background04:05 The State of St...
2024-08-2353 min
Modern CTO#108 Nitay Joffe - CTO and Co-Founder at ActionIQToday we are talking to Nitay, the Co-founder and CTO of ActionIQ. And we discuss activating the next generation of data, the binary nature of most decisions, and how making small incremental improvements over time is the key to long term success.
All of this, right here, right now, on the Modern CTO Podcast
2019-05-2245 min