The Tech Glow Up - Fabulous conversations with innovative minds.

Get an unprecedented front row seat to vulnerable founder conversations with innovation leaders from Blockbuster, Meta, Sony, Cisco, Nokia, and more. Join Nathan C, founder of Awesome Future, for authentic discussions with product leaders, CEOs, and startup founders who share the real challenges of bringing breakthrough ideas to market. Because having a good idea is only the first, easiest part of the entrepreneurial journey. Each episode delivers relatable stories and actionable strategies from people who've navigated the startup trenches. Discover the soft skills and mental resilience that separate successful launches from failed attempts—without getting bogged down in tech jargon. Perfect for founders, product leaders, and entrepreneurs seeking genuine advice on innovation, scaling, and surviving the long haul. These aren't polished product pitches, they're honest conversations about staying in the game until your idea hits.

The Tech Glow Up - Fabulous conversations with innovative minds. is a business podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 99 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.

Unknown Host hosts The Tech Glow Up - Fabulous conversations with innovative minds., a business show with 99 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

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  Episode #52

  The Tiny Sensors Used By The Top AI AR Smartglasses Are Actually A Pretty Big Deal - Omar Abed

  Aug 20, 202610 minS2

  Most conversations about smart glasses focus on the software, the display, or the AI. Omar Abed, CTO of InvenSense, a TDK group company , wants you to think about what's underneath all of that. Get a front row seat to the conversations about AI, AR smartglasses, and the future of enterprise technology from Augmented World Expo 2026. Today's smart glasses carry 10 to 20 sensors each — and by count, sensors are the most numerous component in any pair. They're what connects the glasses to the person wearing them, connects the glasses to the world around them, and generates the raw data that makes the AI useful in the first place. TDK started as the brand on your cassette tape. Today their sensors are inside more than 80% of the smart glasses on the market — you just don't see the name on the box anymore. Omar oversees all of TDK's sensor technology development, and at AWE 2026 he made the case that the next big unlock for wearables isn't the display or the model. It's audio, power efficiency, and what he calls the "disappear effect" — the point where the form factor gets small and comfortable enough that you forget you're wearing them two minutes after you put them on. Key Moments: [00:01:00] Sensors by the numbers: why today's smart glasses carry 10 to 20 sensors per pair [00:02:00] The "disappear effect": what it takes to make smart glasses truly wearable all day [00:04:00] Privacy by design: why keeping data on-device is a prerequisite for mass adoption [00:05:57] Audio as the next wave: why voice is the most natural interface for wearables [00:07:00] Pay it forward: the mentor chain that shaped a career in sensor engineering The technology that makes smart glasses seamless isn't visible. Omar's work is making sure it keeps getting smaller, smarter, and better at protecting the people wearing it. You can learn more about TDK MEMS and TMR sensors in smart glasses at https://www.invensense.tdk.com/en-us/smart-glasses Watch on YouTube → https://youtu.be/kApav6sqA5g Join the Tech Glow Up newsletter on Substack → https://substack.com/@mxnathanc #SmartGlasses #SpatialComputing #TechGlowUp #AWE2026 #Sensors About Omar Abed Omar Abed is CTO of InvenSense, a TDK Group company. He holds degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from UC Berkeley and USC, is a Harvard Business School PLD alumnus, and holds five patents in MEMS pressure sensors. A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself. At The Tech Glow Up , we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders. In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success. If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link .

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  Episode #51

  How To Make Your Tech 10X Better; Include Disabled People In Product Design – Michael Allen Nesmith

  Aug 13, 202620 minS2

  Get a front row seat to the conversations about AI, AR smartglasses, and the future of enterprise technology from Augmented World Expo 2026. Michael Allen Nesmith spent 10 years as a creative director at Amazon's Brand Lab — and built something there that had nothing to do with e-commerce: an in-house interpreting agency that embedded sign language interpreters across his team and eventually scaled to Amazon's global workforce. He left that behind to start Non-Breaking Space , a consulting firm helping tech companies build products that actually work for deaf and hard-of-hearing users from day one. His argument is straightforward. ASL is a spatial language. Signers navigate three-dimensional space as grammar — direction, location, and movement all carry meaning. The smart glasses industry is working hard to invent spatial context. Michael has been living it his whole life. His response when a company builds spatial hardware without any deaf input: "Uh, hello. We're here. We've been here for a very long time." At AWE 2026, he walked me through the survivor bias of accessibility data, the curb cut effect as a product strategy, and what it actually means to pressure-test hardware when you're someone the product was never designed for in the first place. Key Moments: [00:00:29] Non-Breaking Space: why Michael left Amazon to consult on deaf inclusion in spatial tech [00:01:40] ASL as a spatial language: what the glasses industry is still missing [00:05:01] The curb cut effect: how designing for disability creates better products for everyone [00:09:09] Nothing for us without us: what real accessibility in the design phase looks like [00:16:23] Survivor bias and disability data: "No data is data" No data on disabled consumers is not a neutral fact. It's a signal your product isn't reaching them — and that's a design failure. Watch the full episode on YouTube → https://youtu.be/tT2wlc2Z6lc #SpatialComputing #AccessibilityDesign #TechGlowUp #AWE2026 #SmartGlasses About Michael Allen Nesmith Michael Allen Nesmith is a Deaf creative director and accessibility strategist building Non-Breaking Space ( ), a disability-led creative studio focused on emerging technology and accessibility consulting. Prior to founding Non-Breaking Space, Michael spent a decade at Amazon's Brand Innovation Lab, where he led creative on emerging advertising tactics within Amazon's ecosystem. He also built the Fire TV Global Brand Book, now in active use across 1,500+ marketers worldwide. Earlier in his career, he served as Art Director at Wieden + Kennedy Portland, contributing to early concept development for Google Glass marketing, and went on to build one of the first subtitle apps for Glass in 2013, the same instinct that shapes his work today. He holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, three B.A. degrees from Gallaudet University, and a CPACC certification. Michael has delivered a TED talk on inclusive wearable design and has been featured in Forbes, Campaign US, and Puget Sound Business Journal's 40 Under 40. He also founded Amazon's first in-house ASL interpreting agency and has taught design courses and ASL at Columbia College Chicago, DePaul, Portland State, and SAIC. A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself. At The Tech Glow Up , we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders. In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success. If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link .

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  Episode #50

  The Key To Deep Tech Innovation In Enterprise Is Solving Boring Problems - Poz Long, Salesforce

  Aug 6, 202625 minS2

  Get a front row seat to the conversations about AI, AR smartglasses, and the future of enterprise technology from Augmented World Expo 2026. Poz Long is Director of Creative Technology for Sports, Media, and Entertainment at Salesforce. Their job is to help people understand complex products through experiences — not documentation or demos, but through things that move people and actually solve something. Poz's background runs from a theater degree through reality TV post-production, America's Test Kitchen, Bay Area music videos, and eventually into XR at Meta and Apple, where they built a VR synoptophore for pediatric eye alignment testing. A synoptophore is the heavy, aging machine eye doctors use to measure strabismus — eye misalignment — in children. Poz proved it could be done with eye tracking in VR, with a lot more fun involved. At AWE 2026, Poz walked me through the activations they've been building and what they're looking for next. The marquee story: a Super Bowl activation with MrBeast, a 27-day puzzle that could only be solved using a custom Slackbot, and a winner named Colin who used it exactly as designed. 96% of players who used puzzle cards used the Slackbot the same way they'd use Slack Canvas. First-time LLM users, learning through necessity. Key Moments [00:05:07] Why Poz is at AWE: bringing spatial into large-scale activations and finding the right enterprise fit. [00:05:49] The MrBeast Super Bowl puzzle: 27 days, a Slackbot, and Lone Shark Games designing the hardest puzzle imaginable. [00:13:42] Boring problems are the move: why the most useful spatial applications aren't the flashiest ones. [00:20:02] Their Glow Ups for the next 6 months: FIFA, Rayneos hardware, and Headless 360 unlocking Salesforce data on any form factor. [00:23:02] Hot take: career goals are stupid, titles are summaries, and the real job is staying close to what fascinates you. Watch the full episode → https://youtu.be/LYTfmDfrVok Like and subscribe if you want more conversations like this. #SpatialComputing #Salesforce #TechGlowUp #AWE2026 #XR About Poz Long Poz Long is Director of Creative Technology working across AI, data, and emerging interfaces. Prior to Salesforce, they worked as a Creative Technologist at Apple (contract), designing and prototyping internal creative systems used in live production environments under strict confidentiality. Before that, they spent seven years at Meta/Facebook across creative strategy and technology roles, working on immersive initiatives and large-scale platform storytelling. Alongside this work, Poz created the VR Synoptophore, a clinical VR diagnostic tool developed in collaboration with medical professionals. Poz began their career editing and animating Emmy-winning broadcast television at America’s Test Kitchen, before moving into interactive entertainment at Electronic Arts. A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself. At The Tech Glow Up , we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders. In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success. If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link .

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  Episode #49

  Heads Up and Connected - How Snap’s SPECS Are Bringing AR Smartglasses to Consumers - Joe Darko

  Jul 30, 202612 minS2

  Get a front row seat to the conversations about AI, AR smartglasses, and the future of enterprise technology from Augmented World Expo 2026. Joe Darko has spent twelve years at Snap making developers feel heard, supported, and paid. As Global Head of Developer Relations for SPECS, his team answers every email, monitors every Discord thread, and reports directly to CEO Evan Spiegel — who, Joe said, stopped him on the AWE floor to ask one question: "What are devs saying?" The answer that morning: blown away. At AWE 2026, Snap announced SPECS — the consumer AR smart glasses Evan has been building toward for over a decade. Joe walked me through the launch and what it actually means for the developers who've been in the Snap ecosystem, including the concrete steps Snap took to make sure developer loyalty ran both directions before and after a major launch. [00:01:23] Consumer launch: how SPECS differs from the dev kit and what the consumer version unlocks for developers ready to ship. [00:04:52] $1,000 developer credit: every developer who committed to the previous generation of Spectacles received a credit toward the new devices. [00:05:29] What devs are saying: the reaction on the AWE floor to SPECS, the new pricing, and the agentic development tools. [00:06:33] Tokens and a dream: Joe's six-month vision — university students, executives, and non-developers building AR experiences with just a prompt. [00:08:19] Community as the product: why face-to-face developer meetups at Snap labs around the world are the immediate priority after launch. Joe's own origin story starts with wanting to cure AIDS as a kid, pivoting to computers, and landing on what he sees as the next paradigm shift after mainframes, personal computers, and phones. He missed the first boat. He is making sure developers do not miss this one. Watch the full episode → https://youtu.be/Kd-gemJa3KY Like and subscribe if you want more conversations like this. #Spectacles #SnapAR #TechGlowUp #AWE2026 #XR About Joe Darko Joe Darko is the Global Head of SPECS Developer Relations at SPECS Inc., where he leads efforts to grow the SPECS developer ecosystem through strategic programs, partnerships, and community initiatives. He works closely with developers, creators, and partners to empower them to build the next generation of spatial computing experiences. His work focuses on developer engagement, ecosystem strategy, and accelerating adoption of the SPECS platform and developer tools. A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself. At The Tech Glow Up , we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders. In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success. If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link .

  ListenShow Notes
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  Episode #48

  How Devs Are Building Web Apps For Meta Display Smartglasses in Less Than 30 Minutes With No Code - Oscar Falmer

  Jul 23, 202621 minS2

  Get a front row seat to the conversations about AI, AR smartglasses, and the future of enterprise technology from Augmented World Expo 2026. Oscar Falmer has spent eight years helping developers build for wearables — at Meta and at other companies doing interesting work in the space. As developer advocate for things like smartglasses, his job is to lower the floor for anyone who wants to build for AI smartglasses, whether they write code for a living or picked up an AI coding agent on a weekend. The Meta Display Glasses use the familiar Ray-Ban form factor with a monocular waveguide display on the right side. Pair them with the Meta Neural Band — an EMG wristband that reads electrical signals from your wrist to recognize gestures — and you have a device that lets you interact with content without lifting your phone or draining your battery through computer vision. Key Moments: [00:01:27] Meta Display Glasses hardware: monocular waveguide display, 70 grams, Neural Band gesture control, and why battery efficiency matters for all-day wear. [00:05:21] Web apps for Meta Glasses: how the platform opened one month ago and why power users — not just developers — are the ones shipping fastest. [00:06:06] The constellation app: star maps using GPS coordinates and IMU sensors, location-based context without full spatial tracking. [00:11:46] Personal software is here: why AI coding agents and HTML/CSS/JavaScript make it possible to go from idea to running glasses app in 30 minutes. [00:15:50] The Go-Giver playbook: how Oscar's open-source AR glasses dataset went from a single spreadsheet to C-suite circulation and a job at Meta. Oscar builds community the same way he builds tools: share what you know, keep it open, and trust that the right people will find it. His AR glasses dataset — started when he was between jobs, shared for free — was being passed around at the highest levels of enterprise XR before anyone knew his name. Catch the full episode on YouTube — like and subscribe if you want more conversations like this. #SmartGlasses #MetaGlasses #TechGlowUp #AWE2026 #XR About Oscar Falmer Oscar Falmer is a Wearables Developer Advocate at Meta, where he supports developers and companies building for Meta AI glasses. He's spent nearly a decade in XR, previously working in Developer Relations at both Snap and Apple, where he helped developers create AR experiences across mobile, social media, and wearable platforms. A "glow up" signifies a positive transformation, reflecting the journey of becoming a better, more successful version of oneself. At The Tech Glow Up , we humanize the startup and innovation landscape by focusing on the essential aspects of the entrepreneurial journey. Groundbreaking ideas are often ahead of their time, making resilience and perseverance vital for founders and product leaders. In our podcast, we engage with innovators to discuss their transformative ideas, the challenges they face, and how they create value for future success. If you're a founder or product leader seeking your own glow up, or a seasoned entrepreneur with stories to share, we invite you to join our guest list via this link .

  ListenShow Notes

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