Founder Fridays No. 161
IPO Window Wide Open -- AI Creates Work, Not Unemployment -- Neural Band Changes Everything
Happy Friday.
IPO Window Wide Open
The busiest IPO week since 2021 wasn’t just noise—it’s the opening act of a potential $200+ billion liquidity tsunami. Six companies raised $4.4 billion in five days, with Klarna, Figure, and Via leading conservative pricing that delivered sustainable 5-15% pops instead of bubble-era crashes. The real story lies in the pipeline: Stripe ($65B), Databricks ($100B), and AI giants OpenAI/Anthropic ($300B+) are all preparing debuts that could eclipse entire years of historical IPO activity. Smart founders should move now while fundamentals matter more than hype and conservative pricing creates room for genuine appreciation. SaaStr (8 minutes)
AI Creates Work, Not Unemployment
Most companies waste 80% of employee time on necessary but non-strategic busywork that could never justify human labor costs. Box CEO Aaron Levine argues AI agents will unlock massive hidden demand by making previously unaffordable work economically viable—like translating marketing campaigns into 100 languages instead of just five. While Amazon announces headcount reductions, startups with AI leverage can punch above their weight class, acting like 500-person companies with just 50 employees. The real opportunity lies in finding new “nouns and verbs” that software could never handle before but AI agents can now automate at scale. Youtube (12 minutes)
Meta’s EMG Wristband
The killer feature isn’t Meta’s new $799 display glasses—it’s the EMG wristband that reads muscle signals before your fingers even move. While everyone focuses on the in-lens display, the real breakthrough is controlling devices through imperceptible hand gestures, trained on data from 200,000 participants to work universally out of the box. This neural interface could revolutionize accessibility for people with spinal injuries or motor conditions, and represents the first consumer-ready brain-computer interface disguised as a fashion accessory. Meta just made gesture control mainstream by hiding the future inside Ray-Ban frames. Meta (6 minutes)
Founder FAQ: Why are trade secrets important for startups?
Most startups obsess over patents while ignoring their most valuable IP—trade secrets that can last forever if protected properly. Unlike patents that expire in 20 years and require public disclosure, trade secrets like algorithms, customer lists, and proprietary processes can provide indefinite competitive advantage as long as you keep them confidential. The Uniform Trade Secrets Act offers strong legal remedies including injunctions and damages, but only if you take “reasonable” steps to maintain secrecy through NDAs, limited access, and robust cybersecurity. Smart founders realize that sometimes keeping quiet is more powerful than filing paperwork. Westaway (5 minutes)
Startup Funding Guides
I’ve put together a series of guides to equip founders to excel at fundraising. These guides break down the deal term-by-term and give you negotiation tips so that you can speak to investors with confidence.
Convertible Note: Guide / Video
Saving Time and Money on Legal
When we met this Series B startup, they were frustrated with their law firm’s slow turnaround and high fees. Contract reviews took four to six weeks, and they charged $250,000 annually for basic work. The startup wanted to reduce sales cycle times and legal spend. They switched to General Counsel at Westaway. In year one, we 1) saved them about $200,000 in legal fees; 2) shortened their sales cycle by about four weeks; and 3) our streamlined processes saved their ops team eight to ten hours per month previously spent managing legal. By switching to Westaway, they expedited deal closures, saved hundreds of thousands in legal bills and regained one day per month in productivity. If you’re curious if we could save you time and money, let’s talk.
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