Amr Awadallah has seen multiple waves of hype in tech and helped build real companies through it. He co founded Cloudera, took it public, watched it get acquired for 5.3 billion dollars, and is now building Vectara, a platform that helps enterprises ship AI apps that are accurate, safe and actually usable in production.

In this episode, Amr joins Alchemist Accelerator founder and CEO Ravi Belani to unpack a striking finding from an MIT report. An estimated 95 percent of enterprise AI projects are failing.

They dig into why that is happening and what to do differently:

• The real reasons enterprise AI fails in production
  

• Why “go do AI” from the board is not a strategy
  

• How fake exploration budgets create fake success stories
  

• The 3 whys every founder and buyer should test
  

• • Why do anything

  • Why now

  • Why this vendor
    

• How to tell a real business need from AI theater
  

• Why passion for the problem, not the tech, drives grit
  

• How cofounders, early hires and investors make or break your company
  

• What Vectara is building as an “operating system” for AI agents
  

• Why context, security, accuracy and cost control matter more than demos
  

Amr also shares raw, founder level advice. From firing fast in the first 50 hires, to choosing investors who have actually been in the trenches, to his simple test for whether you really love the problem you are working on.

If you care about building AI products that survive past the pilot stage, this conversation is a must listen.

Dr. Shelby Heinecke, Senior AI Researcher at Salesforce, joins Ravi Belani to explain why the future of AI will not belong only to giant models with hundreds of billions of parameters.

Shelby makes the case for small language models: compact systems with only a few billion parameters that can run faster, cost less, protect privacy, and still perform at a very high level when they are trained well on focused tasks.

In this episode, they dig into:

• Why small models are a different tool, not a weaker version of large models
  

• How fine tuned small models can beat much larger models on specific agentic tasks
  

• Where small models shine most: privacy, speed, cost to serve and on device use cases
  

• How Salesforce built “Tiny Giant,” a 1B parameter model that outperforms much larger models on selected tasks
  

• What really matters in training: data quality, workflows and trajectory style datasets
  

• How synthetic data, noise and guardrails help make models more robust in the real world
  

• Why founders should look closely at on device AI and domain specific small models
  

Shelby also shares practical advice for founders who want to build in the small model space, and closes with a simple takeaway: do not underestimate small models.

If you care about AI agents, privacy, edge computing or future startup opportunities, this conversation will give you a lot to think about.

Arjun Prakash, co founder and CEO of DistylAI, joins the Influencer Series to talk about one of the biggest shifts happening in tech right now. We all talk about generative AI, but Arjun breaks down the part that actually matters. Intelligence. Reasoning. And the rise of true AI assistants that can make decisions, take actions, and run workflows across a business.

Arjun walks us through the three chapters of this story:

1. What AI agents really are and why reasoning changes everything.

2. How AI native companies will operate with far lower costs and far more speed.

3. Why this shift will lead to a world where both massive companies and tiny startups can scale faster than ever.

He also gives clear examples of what happens when companies embrace new technology and what happens when they ignore it. From Carnegie Steel to Borders, the winners are always the ones who lean in early.

If you care about innovation, productivity, or the future of work, this episode will change how you see the next decade.

Yohei Nakajima is not your typical venture capitalist. He’s the Managing Partner at Untapped Capital and the creator of Baby AGI, the first open-source autonomous agent that helped kick off the AI agent movement.

In this episode, Yohei joins Ravi Belani (CEO, Alchemist Accelerator) to unpack the rise of AI agents in the enterprise and why experimentation — not just strategy decks — is the real competitive edge.

You'll learn:

• Why every business leader should be personally experimenting with AI

• How AI agents are evolving from gimmick to game-changer

• What it takes to spot high-potential AI startups early

• Why creativity, play, and community might be the keys to mastering this tech wave

Whether you're a founder, builder, or innovation leader, this episode is a must-listen if you want to stay ahead in the age of agents.

🎧 Tune in and let us know what you think: https://bit.ly/3H4XkiJ

As AI-powered copilots and agent tools reshape productivity, one question looms large: Will software engineers be replaced—or just evolve?

In this thought-provoking episode of The Influencer Series, Roger Luo, Founding Partner of Embedding VC and former AI leader at Yahoo, Snap, and Niantic, joins host Ravi Belani to explore:

• Why today’s LLMs outperform average coders—but still can’t replace human creativity

• What tools like GitHub Copilot and Cursors really mean for engineering productivity

• The untold challenges in orchestration, DevOps, and compliance

• How the line between “human” and “agent” might soon blur

• Why AGI won’t come from scaling LLMs alone—and what that means for the future

  
  

Whether you’re a founder, engineer, or AI strategist, this conversation offers a realistic and expansive look at the next era of work.

📣 We’d love to hear your thoughts.
Take 1 minute to complete our short feedback form: https://bit.ly/3H4XkiJ

What does it really take for international founders to succeed in the U.S.? In this episode, Laurent Rains, Managing Director at Alchemist Accelerator, joins host Ravi Belani to unpack the challenges and opportunities facing global startups today.

You’ll learn:

• Why diversity is a competitive advantage — but only if it’s real.

• What international founders must unlearn when entering the U.S. market.

• How AI is reshaping outbound sales and founder workflows.

• Why Silicon Valley still holds the edge in global innovation.

• The nuanced role of governments in startup ecosystems around the world.

  
  

Whether you're launching in a new market or scaling across borders, this episode is packed with sharp insights and global perspective.

We’d love to know what you think!
👉 Please take a minute to complete our short feedback form: https://bit.ly/3H4XkiJ

Most enterprise AI projects today are built on models that can recognize and generate patterns — but what happens when pattern recognition isn’t enough?

In this episode of the Alchemist Influencer Series, Vin Sharma, CEO and Founder of Vijil (and former AWS, Intel, and HP exec), joins Ravi Belani to explore the deeper realities of AI adoption — especially in regulated industries like banking, legal, and insurance.

Drawing from his time leading deep learning at AWS and studying the philosophy of technology, Vin shares why trust is the critical missing piece — and why AI systems must be reliable, secure, and safe before being deployed in mission-critical environments.

You’ll learn:

• Why most LLM-based agents will hit failure modes in industries that matter

• How society and regulation shape the future of AI — not just tech breakthroughs

• What “trustworthy AI” really means (and how to build for it)

• How Vin’s company Vijil is tackling this head-on with enterprise-ready agents

• Lessons from Amazon’s writing culture and how it shaped his startup playbook

If you care about the future of AI, safety, and real-world deployment, don’t miss this conversation.

📣 We’d love your feedback! Please take a moment to fill out our short form:
https://bit.ly/3H4XkiJ

In this episode, Garuda Ventures co-founder Rishi Taparia joins Alchemist Accelerator CEO Ravi Belani to explore why the promise of AI teammates often stalls in the real world. Drawing on his experience as a VC, operator, and startup builder, Rishi explains why psychological friction, status dynamics, and expectation mismatches are bigger barriers than the tech itself.

You’ll learn:

• Why “AI teammates” are fundamentally different from tools—and why that matters

• How expectations vs. reality derails enterprise adoption

• Why status loss makes managers hesitant to deploy AI agents

• What startups need to understand before selling AI into the enterprise

• How to build trust and credibility inside slow-moving organizations

  
  

If you're building AI for the enterprise—or selling into it—this conversation will challenge your assumptions and give you a more grounded GTM strategy.

We’d love to know what you think of the podcast!
Please take 1 minute to complete our short feedback form:👉 https://bit.ly/3H4XkiJ