20 Years of Tech Startup Experiences in One Hour

In the last 20 years I've founded or co-founded 5 successful startups (all of which used data and machine learning) - in this talk I describe my journey and what I learned along the way. Some of the things I discuss include:
- Why you should create a global startup, instead of a regional one
- Why you should generally ignore what older people tell you about your tech startup idea
- How to cultivate the odd mix of arrogance and humility you need to be successful
- Why you don't need to be intimidated by the "big names" in the field
- Why you should be leveraging deep learning in your projects
- How to use the power of mass media to create visibility for your startup

[@thuggfrogg]

As a 5th generation SF/Bay Area native, I think moving to Australia is a top-notch idea. I used to fly to Sydney for work (at Atlassian!), and I could feel the change that Atlassian was bringing to tech in Australia. I think Australia has all the right conditions to start a great company. All of the materials you need to get started are online, and the experience of working at Big Tech Companies isn't relevant. Perhaps the biggest cultural difference is how the SF/Bay Area embraces failure at work - starting a tech company and failing is seen as a valuable learning experience and doesn't brand you as a failure. Last thing - I hope you Aussies know is that Americans *love* Australians, and that being Australian carries only positive connotations. Letting people know you're an Australian company, owning it, and being proud about it will come across very positively in our market. Don't hide from it - embrace it! :)

[@victorhenriquecp]

Nothing like some dose of jeremy howard when you are starting to think about moving from ai into smth else!

[@narwashius1176]

I literally stopped working a year back, now i start working and living. Thanks !

[@thuggfrogg]

I recommend watching Lex Fridman's interviews with "famous" deep learning practitioners (he interviewed Jeremy :) ). It's an awesome chance to hear a thoughtful person have an interesting conversation about life and computation with the people who created the techniques. It really drives home the idea that these are just normal (nerdy) people (with top-notch work experience).

[@yovangrbovich3577]

Thank you for sharing your experiences Jeremy! Lots of good stuff to hear here.

[@anjankatta1864]

Jeremy this was an amazing talk, thanks for sharing your journey so candidly!

[@SheeceGardazi]

Thank you so much for coming back to Australia !!!!!! Cant wait to attend your course live

[@nonamekoala]

Thank you for your speech! It’s amazing you back to Australia. The gap between the academic research and industrial research is huge.

[@cissyma5986]

Love your story and insights! Your points about diversity and important issues to solve with AI (rather than finding cats in photos) really resonated!

[@ignaciocalderondelabarca4326]

Majestic presentation! Thanks Jeremy this has so much value to me

[@vulnerablegrowth3774]

Excited for the startup course. I want to do good and build my own, so it would be fantastic to learn from Jeremy.

[@joshcummins3916]

Thank you Jeremy. It's been a struggle to find a job in machine learning so I think I should just build something on the side and if I don't find a job just pivot to the startup.

[@ricardocalleja]

28:33 "You only get a kind of diversity of problems solved if you have a diversity of people solving them" It is inspiring!

[@yevg3907]

Jeremy should’ve just moved to Texas lol. I am really interested in hearing more about what you think on differences between Australia and USA. Also that start up course with basics you mentioned would be amazing because I just know it will be great. Thanks Jeremy for all you do for us. Also would be amazing to hear about your I guess self taught path from philosophy into tech. Especially in pre coursera type of world

[@swagatochatterjee7104]

It was all around my LinkedIn feed. Dang! Jeremy drops a video!

[@chatsnoirblamo]

Fantastic. I feel motivated. Enjoy being home.

[@hafezfarazi5513]

I cannot wait for your startup cource!

[@LearnWithBahman]

No news after 3 months?!!?

[@merrancooper3307]

Every word describes my journey- investors, advisors- "Lower your expectations" and especially Universities

[@ssw4m]

Thank-you, I am sure this will be invaluable advice for me, and for anyone else wanting to start a tech business.

[@prabhavkaula9697]

Thanks you sir. Hope you are doing well.

[@paco2997]

Looking forward for the new courses.

[@xnxbxs_zx]

Thank you 🙌

[@KetanSingh]

Watched the entire talk now - and it's way too Australia specific than the title suggested. Still lots of interesting advice.

[@rayankejriwal6040]

love u jeremy

[@strauss7151]

Waiting for the upcoming startup course!

[@MAFIMA]

awesome

[@anishjain3663]

Thank you

[@hillstudios1]

Thank you jeremy howard

[@onuryes]

Can I like this video a gazillion times

[@assakurayoh]

16:44 is refreshing, I keep hearing those arguments all the time. The worst part is that it gets to me. Moreover even with a going through success you hear criticism like: 1) Yes but you did not understand anything about life 2) It's not going to succeed, you're too arrogant, and think you're going to make it.

[@laynesadler693]

I came to the same conclusion for biopharma researchers (deep learning data preparation being too much for them). So I made AIQC to make the data preparation/experimentation declarative, but the models components are still imperative. Maybe I should use fastai models for that

[@MirrorNeuron]

I am bit surprised, well rather a bit happy too, to see India trying its best to scale up in the AI development.

[@prabhavkaula9697]

Sir I request you to share your thoughts on cognitive synergy and agi.

[@ilarums]

So true investment is tech in Australia is almost non existent. Customers being conservative tell me about it they are so freaking backward. Loved all the data points Jeremy

[@leowalton1362]

Many years ago I was involved with a company that got an Aus government research grant to put micro-controllers into 2 way radio's, despite ending up being the 3rd largest non-primary exporter at the time they still ended up going to court to get the grant money in the end. From the figures you have shown things still seem exactly the same. Is the issue that the Aus population and economy is comparatively not big enough. Isn't that at least in part of what makes here a better place to live. Like the how, many rats can live in a box experiment, is the feeding frenzy necessary to generate the easier capitol investment environment? Or is the answer to have part of the team away in venture capitol land as part of the exercise ? Or do we have to find less capital intensive solutions " live on grass till the low methane cows come home" ?

[@MiguelRaggi]

Serious question: can we invest in your next company?

[@mundaka87]

00:23:40 00:35:00 00:36:15 00:39:00 00:46:00 00:50:00 01:03:00

[@KetanSingh]

Interesting how your accent is a lot more aussie now!

[@oroneki]

Imagine Brazil! Australia is far ahead

[@ILikeAI1]

Did the startup course end up happening? 58:30

[@radicalrodriguez5912]

what do you do if you have an idea but neither the money nor the technical facilities to make it real?

[@usejasiri]

De-risk the process by working hard to acquire the technical skills so that at least you can develop sth to show for it, it doesn't have to be the full software/engineering product, but just an MVP, investors like that, then you can maybe test it with users. And to be honest, if you have an internet connection these days, you can access the resources to learn a technical skill, also just get yourself into hackathons and look for partners. I got contacted by an investor just because she saw my project on a hackathon, and I hadn't even developed the full app, just a proof of concept

[@BeGunNer]

What is the "you know" of why they "couldn't stay in America, especially after 2020"? Genuine question.

[@thuggfrogg]

As a SF/Bay Area native, I think he's referring to two things: (1) commercial organizations have too much power, and (2) our politics over the past 4 years has been emotionally unbearable. (Ever since Trump left the office, things went back-to-normal politically, though! For example, my dad talks about the things he used to talk about, like fishing and family, and doesn't always want to talk about politics. Everybody I've talked to about this agrees that things are better now, but ofc others will feel differently).

[@BeGunNer]

@@thuggfrogg thanks!

[@carloschau9310]

The Australian mouse plague, I wonder if AI can solve that (preferrably without building weapons with it)

[@guillaumevermeillesanchezm2427]

Funny how we hear exactly the same anti-movation and anti-boldness talks here in France. It's like people here are afraid of success. It even feels like success is illegitimate and if you are successful you should be ashamed.

[@LearnWithBahman]

He said the problem with America you know? No we don`t know tell Us .