Early Access

Go behind the scenes with the people who built it first - the founders and early hires of today’s fastest-growing startups. We dive into the bets they made, the mistakes, the wins, and everything in between!

Early Access is a business podcast hosted by Sarah Du, with 7 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Sarah Du hosts Early Access, a business show with 7 episodes published.

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  Early Access

  Building 0 to 1 AI Products at Nooks (with Alex Zhang)

  Jul 8, 202625 min

  Join me in conversation with Alex Zhang, Nooks' first PM and now Group PM. Nooks is an AI platform building the agent workspace for GTM teams, backed by Kleiner Perkins and Lachy Groom. Alex joined as employee ~50 and is now a group PM, driving many of Nooks 0 to 1 product bets. Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction to Alex Zhang and Nooks 02:15 Career Journey: From DoorDash to Nooks 03:43 Understanding Nooks: The AI Sales Platform 06:30 Human vs. AI in Sales: 09:04 Transitioning from SaaS to AI Native Products 10:52 Creative Solutions: Using AI for Sales Training 12:33 Debugging AI Features: Identifying the Issues 13:14 Exploring AI Interaction and Latency Challenges 14:54 Expanding Product Surface Area 16:54 Growth and Evolution: Alex's Journey at Nooks 18:40 Lessons from "Failed" Products 22:08 Rapid Fire

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  Early Access

  Building 0 to 1 AI Products at Nooks (with Alex Zhang)

  Jul 8, 202625 minS0

  <p>Join me in conversation with Alex Zhang, Nooks' first PM and now Group PM. </p><p></p><p>Nooks is an AI platform building the agent workspace for GTM teams, backed by Kleiner Perkins and Lachy Groom. Alex joined as employee ~50 and is now a group PM, driving many of Nooks 0 to 1 product bets.</p><p></p><p>Timestamps:</p><p>00:00 Introduction to Alex Zhang and Nooks</p><p>02:15 Career Journey: From DoorDash to Nooks</p><p>03:43 Understanding Nooks: The AI Sales Platform</p><p>06:30 Human vs. AI in Sales:</p><p>09:04 Transitioning from SaaS to AI Native Products<...

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  Early Access

  Inside the first BizOps seat at Cogent Security (with Grace Hua)

  Jun 3, 202637 minS0

  <p>Join me in conversation with Grace Hua, head of Biz Ops at Cogent Security. Cogent is building autonomous cyberdefense and recently announced its $42M Series A led by Greylock and BCV.</p><p></p><p>Grace joined as employee ~15 and has spent the last 9 months working across hiring, partnerships, fundraising, and more - essentially operating as an extension of the founders as the company scales.</p><p></p><p>Timestamps:</p><p>00:00 Grace Hua's Journey: From McKinsey to Cogent</p><p>02:43 The Importance of People in Career Decisions</p><p>05:11 Navigating the Startup Landscape: Finding the Right Fit</p><...

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  Early Access

  Inside Braintrust: Scaling a Category-Defining AI Evals Platform (with Sarah Zeng)

  Mar 2, 202626 minS0

  <p>Join me in conversation with Sarah Zeng, who has gone from investing to operating at the forefront of AI - first as one of the first 50 employees at Character AI and now scaling Braintrust. Braintrust is a go-to platform for AI evals and observability. They recently announced their $80M Series B, led by ICONIQ and joined by returnees a16z, Greylock, Elad Gil, basecase and others.</p><p></p><p>Timestamps:</p><p>00:00 Introduction to Sarah Zeng and Her Journey</p><p>02:37 Transitioning from Investing to Startups</p><p>04:57 Joining Character AI</p><p>06:48 The Move to Braintrust</p><...

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  Early Access

  Designing the Standard for AI Detection (with Olivia, GPTZero's First Product Designer)

  Feb 2, 202625 minS0

  <p>Join me in conversation with my friend Olivia Kusio, the first and founding product designer at GPTZero — one of the breakout AI companies of the last two years.</p><p></p><p>Olivia joined as the 5th employee. Two years later, GPTZero has grown to millions of users and $25M+ in revenue.</p><p></p><p>We cover:</p><p>🎨 Designing for trust in AI products</p><p>🧠 How students and teachers are really using AI</p><p>💬 Building culture inside a rocketship startup</p><p>& more</p><p></p><p><b>Timestamps</b></p><p>00:00 Introduction to GPTZero and Olivia...

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