AI Made Tokens Cheap. It's Making Hardware Costly.
Apple raised prices on Mac, iPad, and HomePod, blaming an AI-driven memory shortage. The cost of intelligence is falling; the hardware to run it isn't.
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Posts tagged AI startups
9 posts on AI startups. Or browse the full writing index →
Posts tagged AI startups
What 90 Days of a Fractional Security Engagement Actually Looks Like
Most founders who book the intro call have already read three or four of my posts and arrive at the same question: "Okay, but what would the next 90 days actually look like if I hired you?" Here's the answer — week by week, with the real numbers.
An AI Just Deleted a Production Database in Nine Seconds. Hire More Engineers.
Replit's AI agent ignored a code freeze, wiped a production database in nine seconds, then confessed it violated every principle it was given. The strongest case yet for hiring MORE senior engineers in the AI boom — not fewer.
SOC 2 Is a Revenue Tool, Not a Security Tool
Every AI founder pre-Series A scopes their SOC 2 audit like a security project. Six months later they've burned their best engineer and lost the enterprise deal. Here's how to run it as a 90-day sales project — and unlock the pipeline you're already leaving on the table.
How I'd Run Security at an AI-Native Company in 2026
AI-native companies need a security model that classic appsec doesn't cover. Agents have credentials. Prompts are an attack surface. Training data leaks. The four-layer security stack I'd build, the controls I'd ship in the first 90 days, and the ones I'd defer.
How We Cut $350K From Cloud Spend in 6 Months (And What I'd Do Differently)
Migrating an AI-first product from GCP to Azure cut $350K from infrastructure spend over six months. The negotiation that mattered more than the architecture, the $50K we accidentally cost ourselves back, and the four migrations I'd refuse to do today.
vCISO Math for AI Founders: Why 5 Hours a Month Beats a Full-Time Hire
A full-time CISO costs $200–400K plus equity. A vCISO costs $2–4K a month and gives you 80% of the value at 5% of the burn — until you outgrow them. The math, the deliverables to expect, and the red flags that mean you've hired the wrong one.
How I'd Hire a Staff Engineer at an AI Startup
The title 'Staff Engineer' means three different things at three different companies. At an AI startup pre-Series-A, only one of those three is what you actually need. The screen, the take-home, the interview loop, and the AI-fluency calibration that's now table stakes.
The Pre-Series-A AI Startup Hiring Plan: Who to Hire, in What Order, and Why Most Get It Wrong
Most pre-Series-A AI founders hire in panic order, not strategic order. The result is a team that can't ship the product the company actually needs. The hire-by-hire plan I'd run, who comes first, and why hire #4 isn't another engineer.