The Founder of a $1.5B AI Company on What Comes After the First Wave of AI Apps

**Dan Shipper** (0:00)
You are the co-founder and CEO of Granola, one of the first new AI apps where people are like, holy shit, this actually works.

**Chris Pedregal** (0:07)
Meeting notes are not the end-all, be-all value that everyone's running after. There's something much bigger, and I think we are in the very, very early steps of a computing revolution. What has come thus far will pale in comparison to what will come soon. Startups are like knife fights, and I thought startups were just really hard when they weren't working. Turns out they're really hard even when they're working as well.

**Dan Shipper** (0:43)
Every is the only subscription you need to stay at the edge of AI. If you care about being on top of the latest models and using latest tools, you have to subscribe to Every. We'll help you separate the signal from the noise. Go to every.to slash subscribe today. And now back to the episode. Chris, welcome to the show.

**Chris Pedregal** (1:00)
Hey Dan, great to see you.

**Dan Shipper** (1:03)
Good to see you too, it's been a while. So for people who don't know, you are the co-founder and CEO of Granola, one of my favorite AI apps.
One of the apps that I think really kicked off the wave in like, you know, I guess, two or three years ago, it was one of the first like new AI apps where people were like, holy shit, this actually works and it's useful.
And since then, you've gone on to, I think the team is about 55 You've raised at like a $1.5 billion valuation. You're just killing it. And we had a really good conversation in December, 2024 So almost two and a half years ago about putting soul into your product and making products that are delightful. And I'm just super curious to hear what's on your mind, how things are going and to share out both of our journeys over the last couple of years and think about the future together.

**Chris Pedregal** (1:57)
Couldn't be more excited to chat.
I've been following all the different things you've been doing from a distance.
I'd love to hear the latest from the inside on how that's going. Just to react on one thing you said, you said we're killing it, right? And we're very lucky. Things are going well. Something I was unprepared for. So I did a previous startup and startups are like, they're knife fights, right? They're like really, you know, like they're really, I don't know. Maybe life's easy for you. But for me, it's like, it's really hard. And I thought startups were just really hard when they weren't working. Turns out they're really hard when they're working as well. I guess it's a knife fight when things are going well or not going well. And I was a bit unprepared for that. So it just, I'm very, I had a professor in journalism school who he was basically like, the last thing the world needs is another profile that puts someone up. You know, it's like, oh, this person's so great. And it's like, no, no, everything's hard. It's a day, fight day in, day out. Like that's, that's my mentality. So just wanted to share that.

**Dan Shipper** (3:03)
I feel you, man.
I definitely feel the same way where I've been doing companies for a long time. And every is the first one that's like really growing and just really working in this way that feels like it's a real company. We have 30 people now, you know.
And thank you. And when it is working, like a good example, Claude Tag dropped yesterday. We've been working on a Slack agent, Claude Tag dropped yesterday. And so then everyone's looking at you like, what do we do? And I'm like, we've, we're prepared for this. We've been thinking, we know that we knew this is going to happen. And the, especially in AI, I feel like the ground shifts so quickly. And I assume for you, like one of the things you're talking to, and I'm talking about it, I'm actually really curious is, you were the first one to do really great AI meeting notes and meeting transcriptions.
And then immediately everyone just like put meeting notes into their product. We actually, we have a, we have this product called Monologue that has a meeting notes button, you know?

**Chris Pedregal** (4:12)
Oh, cool. I didn't know that.

**Dan Shipper** (4:13)
So we're like slightly competitive. Yeah, I don't really think of it as being an exact one-to-one replacement. I actually have both on my computer, but still, that's probably what you're referring to when you say knife fight. So tell me about that. What is that like? How is that, has that actually affected your business at all?