Y Combinator Startup Podcast
AI Apps Are Broken — Here's How To Fix Them
In this episode of The Breakdown, Tom and Dave are joined by fellow YC General Partner Pete Koomen to lay out a new vision for how AI should actually work: not as a chatbot bolted onto legacy software, but as a customizable tool that helps people offload the work they don t want to do. From editable system prompts to agents that act more like collaborators, they dig into what it means to build AI-native software—and why the future belongs to products that let users teach machines how to think.
23 May 2025 - 30 मिनट 07 सेकंड
How AI Coding Agents Will Change Your Job
Coding agents are no longer a distant idea—they re already starting to reshape how we work. YC s Tom Blomfield and David Lieb discuss how AI coding tools are transforming software development, why small, high-agency teams will be able to do what once took armies of engineers, and why there s never been a better time to start something new. They explore the bigger picture too: a future where there s abundance, knowledge work becomes more accessible, and founders have more leverage than ever before. If you re thinking about building, there s no better moment than right now.
9 May 2025 - 19 मिनट 11 सेकंड
How To Get The Most Out Of Vibe Coding | Startup School
AI can t yet one-shot an entire product—but with the rise of vibe coding, it s getting close. YC s Tom Blomfield has spent the last month building side projects with tools like Claude Code, Windsurf, and Aqua, seeing just how far you can push modern LLMs. From writing full-stack apps to debugging with a single paste of an error message, AI is becoming a legit collaborator in the dev process. This is a playbook for anyone who wants to get the most out of vibe coding and build faster.
25 Apr 2025 - 16 मिनट 39 सेकंड
How Zepto Became India’s Fastest Growing Startup
Imagine ordering groceries and having them show up at your doorstep in just 10 minutes. That’s the promise of Zepto, the fastest-growing e-commerce company in India. In this episode of How To Build The Future, Garry sits down with Aadit Palicha, the co-founder and CEO of Zepto, to discuss how they got started in a Whatsapp group, what it’s like going up against incumbents like Amazon and Zomato and how the future of e-commerce is changing in the age of intelligence.
18 Apr 2025 - 38 मिनट 23 सेकंड
Why America Stopped Innovating - And How We Can Start Again
Not long ago, America led the world in building and innovation. But over the past 50 years, bureaucracy and red tape have made it nearly impossible to get big things done. Still, there’s a growing movement to turn that around — to build faster, smarter, and better than ever before. In this episode of The Main Function, Garry sits down with Atlantic staff writer and Plain English podcast host Derek Thompson to discuss his new book Abundance (co-authored with Ezra Klein). They discuss how we got here, what needs fixing, and what a bold, more prosperous 2050 could look like.
4 Apr 2025 - 34 मिनट 12 सेकंड
What Founders Can Do To Improve Their Design Game
In this special episode of Design Review, Aaron sits down with Raphael Schaad, the Head of Calendar at Notion to discuss his leap from designer to founder, why illustration is an important first step when building a new product, and what ultimately makes designers uniquely qualified to start a company today.
28 Mar 2025 - 20 मिनट 43 सेकंड
How to Build the Future: Tony Xu
12 years after starting DoorDash, co-founder CEO Tony Xu and his employees still do deliveries every year, staying true to their core value: customer obsession. Today, DoorDash is the largest food delivery platform in the US. In this episode of How to Build the Future, Tony explains how their unwavering long-term vision won — helping create a new market while surviving near death and a global pandemic along the way.
26 Mar 2025 - 31 मिनट 32 सेकंड
Customer Obsession Made Gusto A $9.6 Billion Company
Gusto (https://gusto.com) made payroll and HR painless for small businesses, growing into a $9.6B company along the way. Co-founder CEO Josh Reeves joined YC s Harj Taggar to share how they built a payroll company from scratch and their customer-first approach to product design and culture.
18 Mar 2025 - 24 मिनट 58 सेकंड
The Future Of Design With Figma's Dylan Field
Design isn’t just about making things work—it’s about how they work, says Dylan Field, the co-founder CEO of Figma. As AI transforms tech, he believes a designer s judgment, taste, and agency will matter more than ever. Dylan sat down with YC s Garry Tan to discuss the evolving world of design in the age of AI, the challenging early days at Figma, and how his team forever changed the way designers and engineers collaborate.
13 Mar 2025 - 37 मिनट 41 सेकंड
How To Build The Future: Aravind Srinivas
YC General Partner David Lieb sits down with Aravind Srinivas, the co-founder and CEO of Perplexity, to discuss his origins in Silicon Valley, what it s like to compete with Google, and what the future of search could look like. Apply to Y Combinator: https://ycombinator.com/apply
21 Feb 2025 - 34 मिनट 38 सेकंड