We take notes on the best podcasts so you don't have to. Subscribe to this playlist in your podcast app to automatically get all the episodes we've taken notes for along with the notes themselves! The latest for the tag STARTUP
Bill Ackman is the founder and CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, one of the most closely watched investment firms in the world.
In this conversation, he breaks down how he tells the difference between real innovation from hype, what he looks for before making a billion-dollar investment, and why he sold Netflix—and later bought it back. He also shares the mistakes that reshaped his investment process and his plan to build a modern-day Berkshire Hathaway.
Bill also opens up about something far more personal: his daughter Lucy’s sudden brain hemorrhage, the hours before surgery, and her ongoing recovery. He describes running his business from a hospital room and the institute he and his wife are building to help other families facing similar challenges.
Enjoy!
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Chapters:
(00:00) Intro
(00:53) The Night His Daughter Nearly Died
(08:49) His Plan to Rethink Brain Recovery
(16:15) Could Her Ring Have Raised the Alarm?
(17:07) How He Holds It Together
(23:17) How Bubbles Pull You In
(23:49) Is Venture in a Bubble?
(25:23) When Easy Money Runs Out
(28:05) He Hated the Idea. He Invested.
(30:05) Who Actually Profits From AI?
(35:53) The Rules He Carved in Stone
(39:15) The Trade He Won't Make Again
(42:02) Why He Consults "Dr. Claude"
(46:14) Waiting for a Cheaper Market?
(48:20) Netflix: Why He Changed His Mind
(51:36) Howard Hughes and The Assets Nobody Wanted
(53:22) What If You Owned a City?
(01:00:02) Berkshire's Most Overlooked Advantage
(01:04:36) From Watch Buyer to Company Owner
(01:09:42) How He Judges CEOs in an Hour
(01:14:19) What's Left to Achieve at 60?
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Follow Bill Ackman:
X: https://x.com/BillAckman
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Follow Shane Parrish:
X: https://x.com/shaneparrish
Insta: https://www.instagram.com/farnamstreet/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shane-parrish-050a2183/
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Note: Shane and guests may hold positions in assets discussed in this episode. This podcast is not investment advice, and is intended for informational and entertainment purposes only. Nothing in this conversation should be considered investment advice, financial guidance, or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Always do your own due diligence or consult with a qualified financial advisor before making investment decisions.
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22 Aug 2026
Travis Kalanick, Founder of Uber & Atoms
Travis Kalanick is best known for co-founding Uber and building it into one of the world’s largest transportation platforms. Before Uber, he spent years building Red Swoosh under extreme financial pressure. He says he took no salary for its first four years, repeatedly ran out of money and lost much of his social life to the company before eventually selling it. He later invested much of the proceeds in friends’ startups, becoming the first investor in Expensify.
Kalanick started Uber at 33 and carried the intensity of those earlier years into the company. He describes operating with “precision, perfection and obsession” and continued running Uber with the mentality of someone worried about making the next grocery bill even after the company had reached a valuation of roughly $70 billion. Under his leadership, Uber expanded rapidly across cities and countries, creating a new category of app-based transportation and challenging the entrenched taxi systems that controlled many local markets.
Uber’s growth depended on empowering young operators to build markets from scratch while maintaining tight control over the decisions that mattered most. Kalanick personally participated in the pricing process for the company’s first 20 to 30 cities, using each launch to refine a playbook that could eventually operate without him. He describes this management philosophy as finding the line between order and chaos: using the fewest possible rules while preserving the structure required to move quickly at scale.
After leaving Uber, he returned to company building within months. His current company, Atoms, is developing artificial intelligence and specialized robotics for industries including food, mining and transportation. Kalanick describes his role as “problem solver in chief,” focusing on the most consequential problems that are not already being solved and pursuing what he considers his broader calling: digitizing the physical world.
Show notes: https://www.davidsenra.com/episode/travis-kalanick
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Chapters
(00:00:00) Building Atoms & the Meta Problem of Management
(00:03:51) The Appeal of Impossible Problems: Starting Over in China
(00:12:19) Uber vs. Didi: Copycats, Hypergrowth & China's Rules
(00:21:02) How Network Effects Become an Efficiency Fortress
(00:31:48) Capitalism vs. the Taxi Cartel
(00:44:05) The China War Goes Global & the Entrepreneur's Capacity for Pain
(00:54:04) Life After Uber: Lawfare, Media Narratives & Reputation
(00:58:21) What Founders Get Wrong About Venture Capital
(01:08:35) The Fundraising Playbook: QED Storytelling & a Five-Room Auction
(01:18:38) The Uber Coup, Radical Accountability & Outgrowing Fear
(01:26:42) Why Specialized Robots Beat Humanoids at Industrial Scale
(01:31:30) Finding Your Sport: Food, Mining & the Physical AI Stack
(01:40:14) How to Build Many Companies Inside One Company
(01:46:33) Entropy, Civilization & the Meaning of Progress
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28 Jul 2026
#408 How to Make a Few MORE Billion Dollars: Brad Jacobs
In 2024 Brad Jacobs wrote the book How to Make a Few Billion Dollars.
In the book Brad explains how he built 8 separate billion dollar companies and other lessons from his 40+ year career as an elite entrepreneur.
In the two years since Brad has made a few MORE billion dollars and so the sequel to his first book is: How to Make a Few MORE Billion Dollars.
In this episode I share some of Brad's ideas on raising tons of money (Brad has raised over $50 billion), mastering his integration playbook, ideas for organizational integration, org chart design, and how Brad keeps his mind centered and in a positive place to handle the inevitable ups and downs of building great companies.
Episode sponsors:
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Collateral transforms your complex ideas into compelling narratives. Collateral crafts institutional grade marketing collateral for private equity, private credit, real estate, venture capital, family offices, hedge funds, oil & gas companies, and all kinds of corporations. Storytelling is one of the highest forms of leverage and you should invest heavily in it. You can do that by going to https://collateral.com
Inside a recent episode
Mental Models That Change How You Think | Bill Gurley
Published 27 Jul 2026 · Transcript excerpt
[…] I don't feel a need to drive anymore. What's your take on that? The corner cases. Would you sit in the back seat with your Tesla driving? The corner cases are impossible to fathom right now. Yeah, maybe at some point. I mean, I certainly think if it were in a world that didn't have the randomness of the real world. So if you were in a geographic area where all of the cars were that, it'd be easier to go into that mindset. We got humans that think it's fun to test. People are jumping in front of these cars. That's not good. I was talking to Rory Sutherland. He's like, you can just have fun with this. […]
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