EPISODE · Apr 22, 2026 · 51 MIN

Powering the AI Era

from Radical Talks · host Radical Ventures

Varun Sivaram, Founder & CEO of Emerald AI, joins Radical Partners Molly Welch and Rob Toews to explore what's actually holding back AI infrastructure. While the conversation around AI bottlenecks tends to focus on chips and models, Varun explains why the binding constraint is power, from grid capacity limits and interconnection backlogs to the widening gap between compute demand and energy supply. Drawing on his path from senior energy official in the Biden White House to CTO of India's largest solar company to founding Emerald AI, the discussion unpacks why the fix is software, not just more generation, how Emerald's Conductor platform turns data centers into flexible, grid-responsive assets, and what has to be true for AI infrastructure to scale without breaking the grid.