Logistics is a multi-trillion-dollar industry that quietly powers the entire global economy — and it's shockingly manual. Ryan Petersen, founder & CEO of Flexport, joins the Lightcone to break down how AI is finally touching the physical world: making shipping cheaper, speeding up global trade, and automating work that used to live inside emails, spreadsheets, and phone calls. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 00:51 What is Flexport and what are they doing with AI? 03:17 When did AI tools become serious at the company 06:27 The benefit of internal hackathons 12:03 What internal AI projects have been most impactful at Flexport 14:40 What software can do better and faster in logistics 19:08 Do goods get cheaper if more logistics get automated? 21:18 The spiritual/philosophical implications of AI in society 23:51 How does AI change the model structure for companies? 26:38 Would Ryan have built Flexport differently today? 30:22 Outro Apply to Y Combinator: https://www.ycombinator.com/apply Work at a startup: https://www.ycombinator.com/jobs
Ryan Petersen, co-CEO of Flexport, breaks down ecomm's massive impact on the supply chain and the need to be responsive to customer's changing behaviors. Ryan’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/typesfast Flexport’s website: https://www.flexport.com/ Stay Updated: * Find us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/a16z * Find us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/a16z * Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: https://a16z.simplecast.com/ * Follow our host: https://twitter.com/stephsmithio Please note that the content here is for informational purposes only; should NOT be taken as legal, business, tax, or investment advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security; and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any a16z fund. For more details please see a16z.com/disclosures.
In this episode, Flexport’s co-CEO and Founder, Ryan Petersen, chats with a16z Growth Editor Das Rush. They start with the question of why Ryan has chosen – of all the problem spaces to work on – improving the resiliency of the supply chain. They cover just how complex the supply chain is in the era of ecommerce, evolving customer expectations, and ultimately how we can rearchitect our supply chain to meet them. Given the holiday shopping coming up, you won’t want to miss this! Topics Covered: 0:00 - Introduction 1:33 - Why the supply chain? 3:40 - Land and expand 6:47 - The most interesting company? 9:38 - The impact of ecommerce 14:11 - Building resiliency Resources: Ryan’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/typesfast Flexport’s website: https://www.flexport.com/ Stay Updated: Find us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/a16z Find us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/a16z Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: https://a16z.simplecast.com/ Follow our host: https://twitter.com/stephsmithio Please note that the content here is for informational purposes only; should NOT be taken as legal, business, tax, or investment advice or be used to evaluate any investment or security; and is not directed at any investors or potential investors in any a16z fund. For more details please see a16z.com/disclosures.
Ryan Petersen - https://twitter.com/typesfast - is the founder and CEO of Flexport - https://www.flexport.com/. Flexport is a global freight forwarder powered by software and analytics. They are making international trade easier for over 10,000 companies in 70 countries. They were part of the YC Winter 2014 batch. The YC podcast is hosted by Craig Cannon - https://twitter.com/craigcannon *** Topics 00:00 - What is a freight forwarder? 2:45 - Selling electric scooters on eBay 15 years ago 5:30 - Ryan’s business school experience 10:00 - Amazon competing with their vendors 13:00 - Matt Susk asks - What were the most important takeaways from Columbia Business School? Would you encourage entrepreneurs to pursue a MBA? 16:40 - Tyler Hogge asks - How did you get your first three clients at Flexport? 19:40 - Being a solo founder 22:45 - Varun Khurana asks - What's your strategy for rapidly hiring the best talent in so many different global hubs? 25:30 - Challenges of scaling Flexport 27:15 - Some of Ryan’s favorite books 29:20 - Scaling culture 34:00 - Jassim Ali asks - How has the Trump policy on foreign trade affected your business so far? 39:00 - PowerDecal asks - How do you poach clients from legacy providers? 46:00 - Automation in freight forwarding 49:00 - Jason Yannos asks - If you weren't operating Flexport and had to source a new idea to work on, where would you start? 53:00 - Derisking product ideas 56:30 - Biggest lessons learned at Flexport