Inspired with Alexa von Tobel

Boris Sofman has spent his entire career at the forefront of physical AI. He co-founded Anki, shipping more than 3.7 million consumer robots globally, before leading autonomous trucking at Waymo, where he helped pioneer the world's most advanced driverless vehicle program. Now he's applying everything he learned to the machines that build our world. Boris is the co-founder and CEO of Bedrock Robotics, valued at $1.75 billion, which retrofits existing construction equipment into fully autonomous machines at a moment when demand is skyrocketing and the industry faces a shortage of more than 500,000 workers. What You'll Learn: How leading autonomous trucking at Waymo shaped Boris's vision for the future of physical AI Where autonomous trucking is headed and what the next decade looks like for the industry Why the construction industry is at a breaking point and what autonomy does about it What it actually takes to make a machine driverless outside of a test environment How autonomous heavy machinery will fundamentally change the way we build What the world looks like when physical AI works at scale across the entire economy Chapters: 2:16 Introduction4:40 Boris's Time at Waymo9:35 The Future of Autonomous Trucking13:19 What Autonomous Trucking Looks Like in Practice18:15 How Self-Driving Changes Our Cities20:40 The Birth of Bedrock Robotics24:55 What Bedrock Actually Does26:10 Why Retrofit Instead of Build From Scratch28:23 The Role of Humans on the Autonomous Job Site30:45 The Advantages of Going Autonomous34:05 Big Predictions for Physical AI36:48 The Contrarian Take on Humanoids38:50 What Excites Boris Most39:59 Quick Fire Round Follow Boris Sofman and Bedrock Robotics: Website: https://bedrockrobotics.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/bedrock-robotics/ X: https://x.com/BedrockRobotics  Boris's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bsofman  Boris's X: https://x.com/bsofman Follow Inspired:‍ Website: https://www.inspiredcapital.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/inspired-capital-partners X: https://x.com/InspiredCap Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inspiredcapital/ Substack: https://alexavontobel.substack.com/

Windmill co-founders Max Shaw and Brian Distelburger are building the AI-powered people platform for how companies develop and manage their talent. Founded alongside Mark Tanner, Windmill replaces the broken, once-a-year performance review with something faster, smarter, and that employees actually love. Since launching in November 2025, they've reached more than 100 customers including Kalshi, The Farmer's Dog, and Rho, and Inspired is so proud to have led their recent seed round. As AI makes every employee more powerful, the companies that win will be the ones that put the best talent in exactly the right role. What You'll Learn: Why the current state of performance management is broken How AI will change the relationship between managers and their teams What the future of work looks like as companies grow more complex Why skills assessment is about to become one of the most important things a company can do Why Max and Brian are optimistic that AI will benefit people at work Chapters: 00:00 Introduction  02:33 Meet Max and Brian  03:44 What Is Windmill 05:38 The State of Performance Reviews  09:20 Where Windmill Is Headed  13:20 AI Coaching for Every Employee  16:15 Why They Chose This Problem  18:33 The Biggest Change Management Moment of Our Lives  24:15 Early Traction and What's Working  27:30 Where the World of Work Is Going  34:55 The IKEA Example  36:16 Skills Assessment and Workforce Redeployment  41:18 Why New York  43:35 Quickfire Follow Max, Brian, and Windmill: • Website: https://gowindmill.com/ • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gowindmill/ • X: https://x.com/trywindmill • Max's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/max-shaw-82287025/ • Brian's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/briandistelburger/ Follow Inspired:‍ • Website: https://www.inspiredcapital.com/ • LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/inspired-capital-partners • X: https://x.com/InspiredCap • Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inspiredcapital/ • Substack: https://alexavontobel.substack.com/

Runway founder and CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela grew up in Chile before moving to New York to study at NYU's ITP program, where the seeds of Runway were planted. Since co-founding the company in 2018, he has built it into one of the leading generative video AI companies in the world, having raised more than $500M in funding and pioneered some of the first widely used text to video and video to video models. Runway is now pushing toward what Cristóbal calls world models, systems that can understand and simulate reality in ways that are reshaping film, advertising, gaming, and beyond. The next era of human creativity is just getting started. What You'll Learn: Why world models represent a fundamental shift in how we create and consume content How the democratization of storytelling will change culture as we know it What real time video generation means for the future of entertainment and gaming How AI is poised to transform the advertising industry from the ground up Why optimism, not fear, is the right response to AI and the future of work Chapters: 00:00 Introduction01:30 Growing Up in Chile04:20 What Is Runway06:38 Real World Use Cases10:25 The Technology Behind the Breakthrough12:00 Underestimating the Speed of Progress14:55 If Content Is Free Does It Lose Value20:10 How Runway Makes Money24:05 The Real-Time Generation Revolution29:15 Gaming and Interactive Experiences33:00 The Future of Advertising35:45 The Consequences of Infinite Content37:20 Why Billions of Stories Are Waiting41:00 Will AI Kill Jobs44:00 Quickfire Follow Cristóbal and Runway: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/runwayapp LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/runwayml/  X: https://x.com/runwayml Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/runwayml Cristóbal's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cvalenzuelab/ Cristóbal's X: https://x.com/c_valenzuelab Follow Inspired:‍ Website: https://www.inspiredcapital.com/  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/inspired-capital-partners  X: https://x.com/InspiredCap  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inspiredcapital/ Substack: https://alexavontobel.substack.com/