The VentureFizz Podcast

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442

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Aug 2026

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About the show

The VentureFizz Podcast is the flagship podcast of VentureFizz.com, the leading authority for jobs & careers in tech. In this podcast, VentureFizz Founder Keith Cline interviews the top founders and investors in the tech industry.

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60 recent

August 24, 202646 min

Episode 441: Assil Halimi - CEO & Co-Founder, Apollo Atomics

Episode 441 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Assil Halimi, CEO & Co-Founder of Apollo Atomics. Today we are diving into a topic that is way outside my typical comfort zone: nuclear energy. While fossil fuels still account for roughly 85% of global energy, nuclear power offers incredible energy density, yet conventional reactors take over a decade and billions to build. Apollo Atomics is changing that. Through his research at MIT, Assil realized that existing designs for nuclear haven’t evolved in decades and he set out to change that with a breakthrough approach. Apollo Atomics is an advanced reactor company developing compact pressurized water reactors designed to accelerate nuclear deployment. The company’s core breakthrough is a proprietary compact steam supply system that delivers approximately an order of magnitude higher power density than conventional designs, allowing Apollo to dramatically shrink the reactor while maintaining the same power output. The key benefits for all of this is time and money. The resulting reactor platforms are designed to be factory built, transported by truck, and deployed in less than two years using commercially available fuel, established supply chains, and existing regulatory pathways. The company recently announced an oversubscribed $31 million seed round of funding led by FCVC, with participation from Y Combinator, Alumni Ventures, Robinhood Ventures, and notable angels including Paul Graham. In this episode, we cover: * Advice on how to shift from academic research to an entrepreneurial mindset, plus advice on pitching Hardtech startups. * Assil’s background story and how his interest in nuclear power originated. * His time as an MIT Research Scientist and his process for working on this problem. * How he met his co-founder, Drew Walker, and the origin story of Apollo Atomics. * The breakthrough moment and all the details on how their technology works. * Why nuclear is the safest way of making electricity. * Their experience at Y Combinator, including a funny story about smoke in the parking lot. * And, so much more!

August 17, 20261 hr 44 min

Episode 440: Eran Egozy - MIT Professor + Co-Founder & CTO of Harmonix

Episode 440 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Eran Egozy, Professor at MIT and Co-Founder & CTO of Harmonix, the creators of Guitar Hero and Rock Band. I love interviewing current entrepreneurs who are making waves in the platform shift to AI, but I am also a Boston tech historian with a passion for telling stories about the great tech companies of our past. And do I have an incredible one for you today. Harmonix was a company that became a true cultural phenomenon in the late 2000s. It was an overnight success… well, not really overnight, but rather a 10-year journey of grit and iteration that resulted in video game franchises generating over $1B in revenue with more than 35 million units sold. As you'll tell, I majorly geeked out on this interview. I am not a big gamer, but Harmonix hit massive product-market fit for me: music, gaming, rock star... sign me up! The song selection also struck a chord (pun intended), as it was pure gold. You’ll notice this episode is longer than my typical interview. I went long form because there were just too many amazing stories to tell, including: * Eran’s background story and how he got his start playing the clarinet. * Studying music and engineering at MIT. * Meeting his co-founder, Alex Rigopulos, and how they landed Brad Feld as an early investor. * The seven game iterations with modest success that eventually led to massive PMF with Guitar Hero proving the 8th time’s the charm! * Blowing up and taking the market by storm, leading to their acquisition by MTV Games. * Launching Rock Band with multiple instruments plus the behind-the-scenes story of The Beatles edition. * His current role at MIT as Professor of the Practice in Music Technology. * And, so much more!

August 10, 202651 min

Episode 439: Ben Katz - CEO & Co-Founder, HYBRD

Episode 439 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Ben Katz, CEO & Co-Founder of HYBRD. Did you know that Y Combinator originated right here in Boston back in 2005? It was a legendary cohort with names like Sam Altman, Alexis Ohanian (yes, Reddit started in Boston), and Justin Kan all working on startups in Cambridge for the summer. While the accelerator decided to keep the program exclusive to Silicon Valley long ago, Ben Katz and his team at HYBRD are proving that Boston founders can still break through YC’s ultra-competitive admissions process and leverage that momentum, learnings, and network to build a high-growth startup in Boston. Ben is a WHOOP alum and a lifelong athlete who realized that existing fitness apps were limited and didn’t tell the full picture. To solve this, he co-founded HYBRD, an AI-powered fitness coach that integrates with your wearable devices and apps like Apple, WHOOP, Garmin, and many others. It takes the data from all these sources to create personalized, adaptive training plans that automatically adjust around your life, recovery, and daily schedule. In this episode, we cover: 00:00 Introduction to Ben Katz and HYBRD 03:35 Quick Details on HYBRD 04:43 Applying and Getting into Y Combinator 09:25 What the YC Experience Was Like 11:47 Ben's Background & Early Career 16:54 Working at WHOOP 17:45 Building Fitness Apps at Appex 20:22 The Founding Story of HYBRD 24:28 How HYBRD is Different in the Fitness Category 26:56 Boston's Fitness Tech Ecosystem 28:45 All the Details about HYBRD & How it Works 33:28 HYBRD's Acquisition Strategy 37:05 HYBRD Funding Details 38:07 Details on the HYBRD Team 38:47 Advice for Building a Consumer Company 39:45 What Makes a Great Product Manager 40:47 The Importance of Building a Personal Brand & Voice 44:09 Ben's LinkedIn Strategy 44:45 Building in Boston vs. San Francisco 47:42 Favorite Apps and Recommendations 48:32 Book / Podcast Recommendations 50:26 Hobbies Outside of Work

August 3, 202651 min

Episode 438: Yasmin Cruz Ferrine - General Partner & Co-Founder, Visible Hands

Episode 438 of The VentureFizz Podcast feautres Yasmin Cruz Ferrine, General Partner & Co-Founder of Visible Hands. When it comes to early-stage venture capital, less than 5% of funding goes to women and founders of color. Visible Hands is stepping up to fundamentally change that narrative, not just as a mission-driven play, but to unlock non-obvious, exceptional venture returns. Co-founded alongside Justin Kang and Daniel Acheampong, Visible Hands is a pre-seed and seed stage venture capital firm backing overlooked, formidable founders who are transforming the future. Beyond writing checks, they provide a full continuum of support, including regional fellowship programs like VHBOS, VHNYC, and Blueprint: Tulsa. Chapters: 00:01 Introducing Yasmin Cruz Ferrine, General Partner at Visible Hands 03:02 What Drives Yasmin 06:21 Yasmin's Background 08:15 How Yasmin Got Her Career Started 10:38 Advice for someone considering their MBA 13:44 All About Visible Hands, Including their Investment Philosophy & Support of Underserved Founders 21:01 Details on the Fellowship Program 28:11 Getting in Touch & Common Pitch Mistakes 32:53 Building 0-1 Products 36:27 Visible Hands Portfolio Examples 39:02 The Boston Tech Ecosystem 45:18 The Check Writers Room Podcast 49:15 More About Yasmi - Recommendations - Apps & Books Recommendations and What She Does Outside of Work

July 27, 202653 min

Episode 437: Nick LaRovere - CEO & Co-Founder, Pryzm

Episode 437 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Nick LaRovere, CEO & Co-Founder of Pryzm. It seems obvious that selling to the U.S. federal government is complex, especially if you aren’t one of the traditional defense prime contractors… but it doesn’t have to be that way. Pryzm is out to help companies level the playing field. As I was preparing for this podcast, I learned about things like “J-Books” – the massive justification documents that outline the federal spending budget. While this budget information is public, these documents are notoriously long, dense, and difficult to navigate. This seems like a logical use case for AI. But while many AI tools attempt to simply wrap public data to write proposals, Pryzm goes far deeper. Founded by a team of Colby alumni with backgrounds at Palantir and Lockheed Martin, Pryzm has built an AI-powered command center. The platform unifies market intelligence, relationship insights, and real-time program awareness into a single, actionable view, making it the operating system for federal capture and acquisition. The company recently closed a $12.2M seed funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) through its American Dynamism fund, with participation from XYZ Venture Capital, Amplify.LA, and Forum Ventures. Armed with IL5 and FedRAMP High authorizations, Pryzm is actively modernizing the federal procurement industry. In this episode, we cover: 00:00 Introducing Nick LaRovere, CEO & Co-Founder of Pryzm 04:23 Advice for Building a Startup in the DefenceTech sector 08:55 Nick's Background, Early Influences, & Attending Colby 15:36 Getting his career started 20:06 Early Experiences, including Tesla and Palantir 26:48 Founding Prysm and Its Mission 33:42 Details on the Prysm Platform 36:50 Growth and Scaling of Prysm 40:47 Raising funding from Andreessen Horowitz 45:23 The Importance of Storytelling in Entrepreneurship 46:54 Future Growth and Hiring Plans 47:50 3 Essential Apps 50:25 Book / Podcast Recommendations for Entrepreneurs 52:28 Nick's Hobbies Outside of Work Podcast Sponsor: This podcast is brought to you by one of the strongest longtime supporters of the local startup ecosystem, Silicon Valley Bank, a division of First Citizens Bank. With more than 1,500 bankers and relationship advisors and $44B in loans as of Q4 2025 – SVB delivers expert guidance, specialized products and a team that knows the innovation economy inside and out. Learn more at SVB.com.

July 20, 202648 min

Episode 436: Shilpi Gupta - Founder, Qyn Labs

Episode 436 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Shilpi Gupta, Founder of Qyn Labs. Lived the problem and driven to solve it. If I were a venture capitalist, that would be the most critical pillar of my investment thesis. It’s not impossible to succeed otherwise, but entrepreneurs who have personally experienced the friction they’re solving, I believe, will always have a massive edge. Shilpi fits the mold here. It was her own personal health experience that led her to a stark realization that hormonal health data is currently reactive, fragmented, and sparse. She knew there had to be a better way, so she founded Qyn Labs to solve this problem and as you’ll learn, she is uniquely qualified to build this company. For context, our brain communicates in two ways: electrical and chemical. Hormones are the primary chemical signals in our body, yet we have almost no real-time visibility into them. Qyn is changing that with a data-driven platform designed to bring clarity, precision, and understanding to hormone health through simple, at-home testing. Before Qyn, Shilpi spent her career scaling complex robotics and consumer hardware products. She was part of the Roomba team at iRobot, then she played a key role in making Prime One-Day delivery happen through her work at Amazon Robotics, and then she learned about healthtech while leading product at Pison. Chapters 00:05 Introducing Shilpi Gupta, Founder at Qyn Labs 03:40 Advice for Entrepreneurs Building in the HealthTech Industry 06:25 Shilpi's Childhood and Early Influences 10:29 Career Beginnings and Transition to Product Management 14:11 Experience at iRobot and Lessons Learned 18:18 Amazon Robotics: Scaling Consumer Experience 22:10 Joining Pison and Getting her Start in HealthTech 26:59 What led Shilpi down the path of starting Qyn 30:55 The Details about Qyn and How it Works 37:31 The Flow of Data to the Consumer 40:36 Advice on Building Hardware and Figuring out Manufacturing Partners 42:05 Raising Capital as a First Time Founder 44:34 Qyn's Business Model 45:28 How Shilbi Leverages AI 46:54 Three Apps Shilpi can't live without

July 13, 202653 min

Episode 435: Kojo Osei - Partner, Matrix

Episode 435 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Kojo Osei, Partner at Matrix. The venture capital industry originated back in 1946 in the Boston area, when The American Research and Development Corporation was founded by MIT president Karl Compton and Harvard professor Georges Doriot. From that point, an industry was born, and firms were created, but very few have had the lasting impact and track record as Matrix, one of the OG firms that helped institutionalize this industry. The firm has a tremendous track record through the years making investments in legendary companies like Apple and FedEx… plus category creators like HubSpot, Zendesk, and Oculus… or current investments like Canva, Suno, GOAT, and Flock Safety. Matrix is investing out of its 12th fund, an $800M fund for seed and Series A investments, and the firm continues to have a strong presence on both coasts. Kojo is a Stanford grad, who was the Head of Product at Sirona Medical, the AI operating system for radiologists, before becoming a VC. Now based in NYC, Kojo has been an investor with Matrix for over five years. Some areas of interest these days for investments include agent-driven commerce, how the software infrastructure is getting rebuilt for agents, and model application integrated companies. His investments include companies like Channel3, BoldVoice, Ampersand, and LM Studios. Chapters: 00:00 Introducing Kojo Osei, Partner at Matrix 03:24 What is Agent Driven Commerce 09:45 Koji's background & Early Career 13:20 Joining Matrix as a VC 14:37 Advice for Aspiring Venture Capitalists 17:05 The First Year in Venture Capital 20:26 Details about Matrix's 25:01 Investment Areas of Interest for Kojo 27:48 The Art of the Cold Email to a VC 34:17 Exploring the 'Why Now' Philosophy 37:59 AI: Current State and Predictions 42:06 Common Mistakes Founders Make 44:23 GTM for Developer Products 48:11 Leveraging AI in Daily Workflow 49:23 Kojo's Recommendation & Personal Interests Podcast Sponsor: This podcast is brought to you by one of the strongest longtime supporters of the local startup ecosystem, Silicon Valley Bank, a division of First Citizens Bank. With more than 1,500 bankers and relationship advisors and $44B in loans as of Q4 2025 – SVB delivers expert guidance, specialized products and a team that knows the innovation economy inside and out. Learn more at SVB.com.

July 6, 202637 min

Episode 434: Ted Julian - CEO & Founder, Flux

Episode 434 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Ted Julian, CEO & Founder of Flux. Lots of successful people are very humble. They might credit their success to timing, luck, or another reason to downplay things which is a trait that I do admire. Ted fits the bill here, as he’s very humble. But, as you’ll hear in this podcast interview, his track record is extraordinary. He’s been part of the founding team or leadership team for not 1, not 2, not 3… but 4 exits. Very few, if any, have that type of track record in Boston. It’s obvious that he knows how to time the market with the right product and build an exceptional team to execute and scale. That is exactly why I am so incredibly excited about what he is working on right now. With the current paradigm shift to AI, there is a rare opportunity for proven founders to swing for the fences and build massive anchor tech companies in Boston. Ted’s latest company is Flux, which recently announced $5M in funding round led by Calibrate Ventures, with participation from True Ventures and Glasswing. They have built a code-first engineering intelligence platform that gives engineering leaders ground-truth visibility into the work actually happening across today’s complex, AI-accelerated codebases. Think of it this way: Salesforce completely digitized the sales pipeline, HubSpot digitized the marketing funnel… now, with AI tools helping developers ship code faster than ever before, Flux provides the missing system of record to ensure engineering organizations are optimized with less risk and are aligned with business outcomes. Chapters 00:00 Introducing Ted Julian - CEO & Founder of Flux 03:44 Lessons Learned Around GTM Strategies & Getting Early Adopter Customers 06:58 Ted's Background and Getting his Career Started 07:32 Co-Founding @ Stake & Amazing Alumni 09:26 Other Exits 14:38 Ted's Philosophy of Entrepreneurship 19:34 Why He Keeps Building 22:27 Details on Flux: Transforming Engineering with AI 27:41 Flux's Recent $5M Round of Funding & What's Next 30:23 Their fundraising process 33:53 Leveraging AI in his personal life 36:32 Hobbies outside of work

June 29, 202646 min

Episode 433: Roy Hotrabhvanon - CEO & Co-Founder, PlayerData

Episode 433 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Roy Hotrabhvanon, CEO & Co-Founder of PlayerData. Some companies seem like they were just meant to happen, which is certainly the case for PlayerData. Back in 2016, Roy was on track to compete in the Rio Olympics for archery when a severe car accident completely derailed his plans. But instead of letting that tragic incident define him, Roy picked himself up and built a tech company around the specialized performance tracking tools he had originally hacked together to train his own body. He was using sensors and data to optimize his performance, which certainly was not common practice back then. His firsthand experience seeing what hardware, software, and data could do for athletes sparked the foundation for PlayerData, and his timing turned out to be absolutely perfect. Fast forward, PlayerData helps athletes at every stage of their game build confidence, stay healthy, and work smarter with the company’s world-class performance tracking technology. The company recently announced a $12M from Kevin Durant’s 35V, Tennis Australia, Darco Capital, and Pentland Ventures, and what is also really exciting, they announced the move of their U.S. headquarters from Philadelphia to Boston. As you’ll hear from this interview, PlayerData is relentlessly innovating. In addition to their core wearable tracking platform, they recently partnered with Mitre to launch the world's first GPS-enabled "Connected Ball" which is FIFA certified. Now, coaches, trainers, and athletes have even more data to optimize training and performance. In this episode of our podcast, we cover lots of great topics, including: Chapters: 00:00 Introducing Roy Hotrabhvanon, CEO & Co-Founder, PlayerData 04:33 Fundraising for a Hardware / Software company in the sports industry 07:37 Roy's background - Growing up in Thailand 11:02 Meeting his PlayerData Co-Founder, Hayden Ball 11:39 What he was tracking that led to starting PlayerData 13:40 The early days of PlayerData 18:30 "Hardware is Hard" - Experience building hardware in the sports space 24:12 PlayerData today - Details on the Company and how it works 27:22 Collecting data in practice and real game situations 28:48 The platform's ease of use and portable nature 31:29 Details on the cloud-first tech behind the data 34:24 Leveraging AI for Enhanced Coaching 35:39 Strategic Expansion into the US Market 36:54 Why Roy chose Boston for their US Headquarters 37:48 Scaling Operations and Team Growth 38:57 Go-to-Market Strategies for Broad Accessibility 41:00 What's next for PlayerData 41:48 Advice for Founders in the Sports Tech Industry 43:03 Integrating AI into Daily Operations 44:17 3 Apps Roy Can't Live Without 45:29 Book / Podcast Recommendations 46:00 What He Does for Fun Outside of Work

June 22, 202656 min

Episode 432: Johannes Galatsanos - CEO& Co-Founder, Diffraqtion

Episode 432 of The VentureFizz Podcast features Johannes Galatsanos, CEO & Co-Founder of Diffraqtion. I’m incredibly lucky to host this show because the guests I interview are truly out to rewrite the rules of what's possible. Johannes is a perfect example. He brings over 15 years of deep expertise across AI, quantum tech, and operations across a career that includes lots of deep research in academia to executing massive, corporate AI initiatives at global giants like Novartis. So, what does someone with that background do to push the absolute limits of technology? How about building a space company that is creating the world’s first quantum camera to help satellites and machines see further and think faster? By blending quantum photonics with cutting-edge AI edge-computing, Diffraqtion’s technology enables satellites and telescopes to bypass traditional lens constraints entirely—delivering 20 times higher resolution and 1,000 times faster processing speed, all at a fraction of the cost. As you’ll hear from this interview, there are a countless number of use cases and industries that are perfect for Diffraqtion’s technology, which puts them in an ideal spot to build a massive anchor tech company in the Boston startup scene. Chapters: 0:00 Intro 02:37 What is Quantum Computing? 11:40 Johannes' Childhood in Greece and Early Interests 14:52 Transition from Academia to Industry 20:46 Introduction to Diffraction and the Quantum Camera 25:03 Quantum Camera Applications in Space Domain Awareness and Earth Imaging 27:26 Commercializing the technology 28:48 Manufacturing Challenges and Building the Quantum Camera 33:56 Building in Public and Strategic Networking 39:38 Their Innovative Rolling Funding Strategy and Capital Efficiency 45:50 Perfecting their Investor Pitch 49:08 Why Boston for Space Tech Innovation? 53:26 Excitement About Space Industry and Artemis Missions 55:43 Closing Remarks