20VC: "Anti-Data Centres is a Chinese Psyop" | How Many Planned Data Centers Will Actually Get Built? | Is Energy AI's Biggest Bottleneck? With Thomas Sohmers, Co-Founder @ Positron

Thomas Sohmers (0:00)

I would say I'm overall opposed to the pace of the frontier direction it's going in. The scariest thing to me on the political spectrum and the way all of this is being treated is that it's now become an almost unifying issue on left and right about being anti-data centers. I think that is almost entirely a Chinese Psi-op. A single in and out uses more water than the largest data centers in the United States.

Harry Stebbings (0:22)

This is 20VC with me, Harry Stebbings. Now we have probably one of the most important times in history for technology. We have the biggest model provider saying we need to pace the frontier. But what does that actually mean in reality? How possible is it? What does it mean for the threat from China? What does it mean for the infrastructure layer moving forwards? We have a true expert of the space on the show today in the form of Thomas Sohmers. He's the co-founder and chairman at Positron AI. They just raised an $875 million Series C at a $5 billion valuation. They've got some of the best investors in the business, including the one and only Gavin Baker at Atreides and many more great names. Thomas did not hold back in this episode, and it's this beautiful combination of incredible education on the infrastructure that powers this economy for AI, and then also, I don't know how to say it, but analytical gossip would be a more intellectual way of saying incredible discussion about what we can expect in the next few months from the biggest players in this space. But before we dive into the show today, the best model for your application might not exist yet. The most ambitious AI teams are training open models to beat the frontier in their domain. Now, on November the 3rd in San Francisco, Forge by Fireworks brings those teams together. People like Jensen Huang, CEO of NVIDIA, Michelle Katasta, President and Head of AI at Replit, Lin Kuo, CEO of Fireworks and more, to hear how AI leaders are taking control of their differentiation, margins and roadmap by owning their intelligence. Learn how they're building it with inference, training and intelligent routing. Forge is free to attend, but space is limited. Apply today at fireworks.ai/forge.

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Thomas Sohmers (3:58)

You have now arrived at your destination.

Harry Stebbings (4:01)

Thomas, I am so excited for this dude. I said to you just before this, that I think there are some big questions that the world doesn't know, or things that they know, that I think we're going to correct today. Thank you so much for joining me.