qasar

Agreed. AV regulation is early and we're involved in that conversation. We (and I think many in this business) deeply care about safety and believe better technical understanding among lawmakers around software safety will result in better laws. Re: mythical man-month and pareto - 100% true for all AV makers but theory and practice is different. I imagine both their investors and their perception of market forces drive decisions to some degree. This is where you see some gaps (not always) between traditional software lineage companies and traditional OEMs.

We're super familiar with CarMaker -- great for dynamics and some level 2 stuff but there are some big difference between autonomy levels (from simulation perspective at least). At higher levels, autonomy algo development is more like modern software development. CarMarker is a fantastic product (along with CarSim, dSpace ASM...etc) but they were built for a different use cases. A very crude analogy would be tools for J2MEE vs modern tools for iOS/Android. Our product is available, just not very public about our more detailed approaches because that is really where our IP is. Feel free to reach out if you want to chat. Obv, i'm super interested in the topic.

Qasar here (x-YC founder and partner). So im building a simulation company. Not commenting on Uber specifically but the reason lots of companies don't have great efforts is simulation is actually really hard. It’s not building a web application (tested methodologies, established best practices, lots of experienced engineers in the space...etc).

You can get a lot done (and get wonderful demos) through research vehicles. The issue with sim is similar to the issues with AVs as a whole - getting to 90% is much easier than getting to 99.9999%.

Also, there is this weird thing in AV (and specifically in-house sim) where pointy-haired managers think "if we put 30 SWEs on the problem - we'll make progress!". While raw eng horsepower matters in some software problems, when you are on the line between research and engineering, more SWEs might actually make getting a robust product up harder.

Another thing we've seen is in-house efforts overfit solutions. They don't really have a wide viewpoint (nature of how secretive the space is), and therefore go down paths which are just plain wrong but no one is there to challenge them.

I'm Pakistani and one of two partners at YC who works closest with Pakible. This thought has literally never crossed my mind in 5 months since we funded them.

Something that might not be obvious to those who haven't been is that being in person at startup school is markedly different than just watching the talks online. Mainly that it's one of the few events where there is a critical mass of like minded people who are seriously looking to start companies. Perhaps it's because there is a common objective and a high caliber of participants, I always leave startup school energized and inspired.

I worked at Google for 3 years and GM for 5 years (including engineering in Cadillac) so when I see news about the companies, my ears tend to perk up.

A few things should be set straight. Google was not (and by a long shot) the first to think of and try to develop self driving technology. I'm disappointed to see technical people in silicon valley not think a bit more critically. All OEMs and many tier 1 suppliers have thought about and (especially larger players) tried to build self driving cars. When you're a company like Denso or Bosch, this is a massive opportunity and not to aim a few people of your hundreds of thousands of employees to the problem is hard to imagine even if you know nothing about automotive. To be clear when I worked at Bosch from 2004-06, this tech was in development.

Secondly, the HN crowd specifically is notably biased. Check out Google self driving announcements vs GM (or any news about automotive manufactures other than Tesla). Having worked at both companies in product and engineering - yes they are of course different. But not nearly as much as you think. The single most notable difference is that Google is a very margin rich business. That allows the company to attract and retain top talent but it doesn't mean engineers that doesn't work at Google are bozos.

Thirdly, the technology that traditional OEMs have tried to develop is around 2 axis - cost and safety. Google is approaching the problem differently. Google's approach of a $x0,000 LiDAR system might prove to work if LiDar costs fall but thats a big risk. Also, Google admits that their cars don't work in things like rain. I'm not saying Google won't win this space - the contrary, I think they have a great shot. What i'm saying is this is significantly complex tech and its complexity is hard to understate. There can and will be different solutions that work.

Lastly, GM and Google are not the only ones in the game. Nissan and Mercedes have announced they will have cars with similar tech in 2017/18. Ever single automotive player is investing huge amounts of resources.

That's very broad question like "how do you become good at basketball?". I emailed you some starting points. We can continue the conversation there.

Alexis just told me about these comments. You guys know that I can't impact your careers anymore right! :) Jokes aside, thank you for the kind words. It was an amazing few years.

Warning flags should get raised when statements are made about how a company's health makes more sense "when we stop trying to understand it by looking at financial statements".

In finance, creativity is not an asset and the standardization allows the public a structure to critically assess the organization. Specifically against other similar organizations. Of course, if there were financial statements made specifically for (let's say) Twitter - Twitter could highlight all their strengths and quietly hide their weaknesses. I'm not sure that's what is best for the public.

After spending 2 years of my life in a retail turnaround backed by an activist investor (Eddie Lampert at SHLD), I can't say i'm that surprised.

This game of retail is much harder than it looks from afar. Certainly much harder than working at places like Google or Apple - mainly because the market forces are against you. You're working with low margins, high capex, deteriorating infrastructure, deflated brands, legacy technology and a legacy customer base. To top it off, the shear momentum of companies this large (at SHLD we had 300,000 employees) is alone hard to grapple with even if you didn't have market forces against you. It's a daunting task.

If non-linear equity growth was easy, everyone would be doing it. Turnarounds are not for the weak of heart. Turnarounds in that sense, are actually similar to startups.

I disagree. I think working at a large company for long periods of time can actually stifle your ability to be a great founder. You learn bad habits and your intuition can be deformed by things which help you become successful at Big Co but are useless in early stage companies.

Also, I'm at Google and I know John and his work really well. It's almost laughable to imply it was involuntary. John is an all star. The guy actually wants to do a startup because he find the challenge interesting.

What's fascinating for a company like Google in SV is no matter how good things are, you have to constantly fight to keep folks like John from trying their hand at early stage life. Overall I think it's great for the ecosystem. This type of non-traditional churn (where employers not only have to be the best of the "Big Co.s" but better than doing something completely on your) own pushes everyone to create environments that are not only innovative and rewarding but also fulfilling.

Being a founder and now at Google (John and I started almost the same time and I know him well), I think what's notable about this post is when people usually write "Why I left Google" they are sometimes backhanded compliments or thinly veiled complaints.

What John is saying "I had a great time and learned a lot but I still think starting a company is more interesting".

That is tough to hear. I've never met Mike Moritz but he has had a notable impact on my life. I read an interview once where he said that he likes to invest in people under 30. When I heard that in my mid-20s I made it a point to move to silicon valley as soon as I could.

Whenever people would ask why I had this irrational sense of urgency of leaving Chicago (where I was doing my first startup) I would say "Ever heard of this guy Mike Moritz? He said they don't like to invest people over 30 and i'm already 26!" Of course it was me just rationalizing but nonetheless it's the first thing that comes to my mind when I hear anything about Mike. Like Napoleon said, "Everything on earth is soon forgotten, except the opinion we leave imprinted on history"

You know what's more satisfying than being a wage earner at Google or Facebook? Running your own company.

One hypothesis could be that all organizations go through waves of growth and success which then impact the subsequent talent they attract.

In other words, the most recent wave of talent that Greg Smith talks about is more interested in being associated with the Goldman brand, rather than the genuinely possessing the underlying desire to be world class bankers.

Also, perhaps this happened years ago and now its too late because those B players are now running the show.

If having experience and dedicating entire lives to the subject was the requirement for success, I think it would be easier to build great companies. 'Experience' can in many ways prohibit innovation because it constrains ones horizon.

Good work Waseem/Khuram. Inbox2 going to live on for the iPad? Moving into 500?

The S11 demo day writes up are probably one of the best ways to get a sense of what the early stage ecosystem looks like right now. Its not a bad picture either. These are some great startups - mature and refreshingly diverse. It's a good time to be an entrepreneur in the valley.

Its only anecdotal, my brother in law is an Indian Muslim from UP. He says the 1-2 blow of being a communal society and being the largest minority doesn't create the best situation.

Minorities getting the short end of the stick in terms of education and opportunities isn't exclusive to India (see the US - arguably the best nation on the planet for minorities that still stuggles with this), its just a more central topic because of the sub continent's partition history.

Being a Pakistani (and Punjabi) American myself, I do not agree with some of the views the author puts forward.

First, Pakistanis do define themselves primarily as 'non-Indians'. However, the view that Pakistan has somehow carved out a new identity is the past 60 years is false. 5,000 years of shared heredity, language, customs and political history don't shake off that easily. Even Pakistanis and their relationship to religion is very similar to Indian Hindus and their relationship to Hinduism. Just as there are extremist groups in Pakistan, there are extremist Hindus in India. Pakistani's are more Indian that they want to believe and vice versa - especially if you live in the West where the two groups meld together indistinguishably.

The second point I disagree with is that minorities left only Pakistan (because of communal violence). History shows that there was a reciprocal exodus of Indian Muslims to Pakistan. Communal violence is one of the defining aspects of the sub continent.

Lastly, many of the poets, philosophers and British bureaucrats did predict one thing correctly - being a minority in a Hindu majority India ultimately would have a ruinous effects on Indian Muslims - formerly some of the most educated and economically prosperous citizens of India. South Asian culture is one of rabid communalism and today Indian Muslims are less educated, less wealth and less politically represented than in any part of India's long history.

Sometimes I wonder what impact it would have had on both sides of the border if the new nation had been called "West India".