Azeem Azhar's Exponential View

Companies of all sizes and sectors have committed to net-zero emissions targets, but getting there is not straightforward. Measuring carbon dioxide output is tricky, carbon markets are fragmented, and the quality of offsets varies hugely. Michelle You, co-founder and CEO of Supercritical, is on a mission to help companies better measure, reduce, and remove carbon emissions – and her first target is the tech sector.

Some people see cryptocurrencies as speculative assets with no real utility at best, a Ponzi scam at worst. For others, they’re the future of money. Do Kwon, founder and CEO of Terraform Labs, the company behind the Terra blockchain, discusses his vision for a decentralized financial ecosystem with Azeem Azhar.

Azeem Azhar sets out his vision for 2022 and shares the trends that he thinks will change our world this year. Some changes are hurtling down the pike, like the growth of Web 3.0 and the metaverse, while others are rumbling along more slowly: the continued dominance of Big Tech and the tireless march of artificial intelligence.

As 2021 draws to a close and Covid cases spike, it’s easy to think not much has changed. But in between pandemic waves, we’ve made major progress in science and technology. And that progress gives us clues about how the future might play out. Azeem Azhar reflects on the tech trends we’ve seen this year and key shifts in industry and society that are changing cities, the labor market, and the superconductor business.

Andreessen Horowitz general partner Andrew Chen and host Azeem Azhar have something in common: they were both tech company insiders and early-stage investors before becoming authors. They explore why they decided to write their books, how writing intersects with their day jobs, and whether they’d do it all again.

Quantum computing won’t be an incremental improvement – it will represent a step-change in the power of the computing technology that underpins our modern economy. Exponentially faster computing won’t just help us solve problems more quickly – it will allow us to get the answers to questions that have been impossible to answer. Chad Rigetti, founder and CEO of Rigetti Computing, speaks to Azeem Azhar about just how revolutionary quantum computing will be.

Nuclear fusion seems to have been “twenty years away” forever, but recent advances could mean fusion is finally on its way to becoming part of our energy mix. Azeem Azhar speaks to Nick Hawker, co-founder and CEO of First Light Fusion, and explores how their “projectile fusion” approach might produce abundant, sustainable energy.

Murray Shanahan, professor of cognitive robotics at Imperial College London and a senior research scientist at DeepMind, joins Azeem Azhar to discuss AI: where developments have exceeded expectations, where they have fallen short, and what the next steps are towards an artificial general intelligence.

Former Greek Finance Minister, economist, and bestselling author Yanis Varoufakis joins Azeem Azhar to discuss his speculative novel Another Now. The book isn’t pure fiction; it’s an optimistic vision of what our society could yet become -- a world where mass organization, technological progress, and an overhaul of companies and markets have made society more equitable.

Investors Nathan Benaich and Ian Hogarth co-author the influential, annual “State of AI” report. They join Azeem Azhar to discuss breakout developments in disparate fields, from defense to medical biology. And they offer their take on the flood of new investments into AI and how we can best keep the technology safe for humanity.