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Office Hours Podcast: Enormous Rockets Made By A Printer - A Conversation With Relativity Space's Tim Ellis
Spencer Rascoff
Spencer Rascoff serves as executive chairman of dot.LA. He is an entrepreneur and company leader who co-founded Zillow, Hotwire, dot.LA, Pacaso and Supernova, and who served as Zillow's CEO for a decade. Through his startup studio and venture capital firm, 75 & Sunny, Spencer is an active angel investor in over 75 companies and is incubating several more.
Led by Tim Ellis, Relativity Space is radically upending the aerospace industry by manufacturing rockets using 3D printers. In this episode of the Office Hours podcast, hear my conversation with Tim, as we dig into Relativity's engineering feats, its vision for the future of humans in space, what the cutting-edge company values above all, and how in the not-too-distant future Relativity hopes to send a 3D printer to Mars to print rockets there.
Want more? Subscribe to Office Hours on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify iHeart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Spencer Rascoff serves as executive chairman of dot.LA. He is an entrepreneur and company leader who co-founded Zillow, Hotwire, dot.LA, Pacaso and Supernova, and who served as Zillow's CEO for a decade. Through his startup studio and venture capital firm, 75 & Sunny, Spencer is an active angel investor in over 75 companies and is incubating several more.
https://twitter.com/spencerrascoff
https://www.linkedin.com/in/spencerrascoff/
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On this week's episode of the L.A. Venture podcast, hear from Chang Xu, partner at Basis Set Ventures, a $140 million fund focused on AI and automation - technology that transforms the way people work.
<p>Basis Set Ventures focuses on four pieces: infrastructure, collaboration, automation and autonomy. Chang spends a lot of time on infrastructure, and she breaks it down into four themes: raise the ceiling, lower the floor, open space and data privacy. <br/></p><p>By raise the ceiling, Chang says there's<em> "</em>always going to be better and more secure and faster fundamental building blocks for infrastructure to the tune of database systems and streaming data and...infrastructure as code." </p><p>Lower the floor is about no code and low code, which, for example, could allow for not-trained people to build their own apps without relying on software developers. Chang predicts a proliferation of tools that she says will enable "people to create regardless of their technical abilities and their starting point."<em></em></p><p>When I heard "open source" I figured she meant "free." But, Chang says, open source "<em></em>is almost table stakes for how infrastructure is discovered, bought and sold today." </p><p>Lastly, Chang says they see "data privacy as a really large tailwind and emerging space" because it is tackling the challenge of adhering to privacy regulations, but at the same time innovating fast, while taking advantage of the growing amounts of data companies are amassing.<em></em></p><p>Chang and her partners aren't just stuck on tech, they're also keenly interested in what makes a lasting and impactful founder. She says her firm's research has revealed that "successful founders are humble operators, agile visionaries and seasoned executives. And the less successful founders...are passionate outsiders, overconfident storytellers and stubborn individuals."<em></em></p><p>This interview goes deep into machine learning optimization (ML Ops), what Chang learned from her many years at Upfront, like how to craft a good narrative and practical advice for startups on how to form a board. </p><p>Not incidentally, Chang is L.A.-based, though the Basis Set operates out of San Francisco.</p><p><strong>Chang Xu</strong> is a partner at Basis Set Ventures. Previously, she was a principal at Upfront Ventures, the oldest and largest SoCal-based early stage venture capital firm. Prior to joining Upfront, she was a founder and operator. She was the first product manager at the Minerva Project. She co-founded and was the COO of Onion Math, an edtech startup in China that has raised $90 million to date. She started her career at BCG where she advised clients across technology, retail, healthcare and private equity. She holds an MBA and AB in Applied Math and Computer Science, both from Harvard. <a href="https://www.basisset.ventures/team" target="_blank">(bio from Basis Set).</a><a href="https://www.basisset.ventures/team" target="_blank"></a></p><em><em>dot.LA Sr. Podcast Producer & Editor <a href="https://dot.la/u/laurelmoglen" target="_self">Laurel Moglen</a> contributed to this post.</em></em>
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Minnie Ingersoll is a partner at TenOneTen and host of the LA Venture podcast. Prior to TenOneTen, Minnie was the COO and co-founder of $100M+ Shift.com, an online marketplace for used cars. Minnie started her career as an early product manager at Google. Minnie studied Computer Science at Stanford and has an MBA from HBS. She recently moved back to L.A. after 20+ years in the Bay Area and is excited to be a part of the growing tech ecosystem of Southern California. In her space time, Minnie surfs baby waves and raises baby people.
The Santa Monica-based movie-ticketing service Atom Tickets has pre-sold more tickets for "Godzilla vs. Kong" than any film since the start of lockdown.
Following a disastrous year for the box office, its performance could be a litmus test for Hollywood and the many theaters that teetered on the brink during the pandemic.
<p>The big-budget action movie from Warner Brothers debuted on HBO Max this week and is hitting the big screen while many schools are on spring break. </p><p>"You're afraid to be like, 'It looks like we're almost at the end,' but it feels like we're making a lot of progress," said Atom Tickets co-founder and chairman Matthew Bakal. "The hunger of people going back is pretty palpable."</p><p>One big reason for the boost is that more seats are for sale as theaters have increasingly reopened. Several cinemas in Los Angeles opened on March 15th at 25% capacity. That will expand to 50% on Monday. Earlier in the month, theaters began opening at limited capacity in New York City and San Francisco.</p><p>These three regions comprise about 20% of the overall domestic market, Bakal said. Partly as a result, <a href="https://variety.com/2021/film/news/godzilla-vs-kong-box-office-opening-weekend-1234940269/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">"Godzilla vs. Kong" will be playing on more American screens than any pandemic-era film</a>. </p><p>"In November the story was, no one was sure what the future holds," he added. "Now it seems pretty clear that the future includes robust moviegoing as we get into this summer."</p><p>Another sign of pent-up demand is that outside the U.S., fans have been flocking to the silver screen. </p><p>"China, Japan [and] Australia have been booming for moviegoing," Bakal said. "It's like 110-115% of pre-COVID revenue, even at a 70% attendance cap."</p><p>Despite the optimism, in certain ways the pandemic likely has irrevocably changed the movie business. The theatrical window – the period when new films play exclusively in cinemas – has continued to erode. <a href="https://dot.la/hbo-max-movies-2649127184.html" target="_self">Warner Bros. will be debuting its entire 2021 slate on HBO Max</a> at the same time the films hit the big screen, a decision that studio chief Ann Sarnoff described as "temporary." <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2021/3/23/22346947/black-widow-cruella-luca-disney-plus-streaming-premiere-access-marvel-theaters" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Disney recently announced "Black Widow," its biggest blockbuster since lockdown began, will be available on Disney Plus</a> the same day it hits theaters this summer; the company has not taken a definitive stance on whether that will become the norm. </p><p>Many industry insiders have long argued that the window has been overdue for a washing. </p>
The Theatrical Release Window: Will the Changes Last?
<span style="display:block;position:relative;padding-top:56.25%;" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e7bb2683314ede849919cd30d57c4099"><iframe lazy-loadable="true" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZOlPoYDVYwk?rel=0" width="100%" height="auto" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" style="position:absolute;top:0;left:0;width:100%;height:100%;"></iframe></span><p>"If you're doing 90% of your business in 30 days, it's silly that there isn't an opportunity to see films at home on day 31," <a href="https://dot.la/google-ventures-future-of-film-2646011405.html" target="_self">former Disney exec Craig Kornblau told dot.LA</a>, when Universal and AMC were publicly feuding over the film studio's decision to debut its "Trolls" sequel on NBCUniversal's Peacock streaming service.</p><p>For decades the window has been steadily shrinking. <a href="https://www.natoonline.org/data/windows/" target="_blank">At the beginning of the millennium, major studios generally adhered to a period of 150-200 days</a>, according to the National Association of Theater Owners. Just before the pandemic, that had fallen to a 90-day standard, which now appears set to shrink further – though not quite shut.</p>
<p><br/></p><p><span style="background-color: initial;">"It looks like people are coalescing around a 45-day window," Bakal said, pointing to a string of recent announcements from several studios and theater chains.</span><br/></p><p>"Ninety percent of revenue from theatrical movies are made in those first couple of weekends," he noted. "So as long as there's a solid exclusive window, things should return to relative normalcy." </p>From Your Site Articles
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Sam primarily covers entertainment and media for dot.LA. Previously he was Marjorie Deane Fellow at The Economist, where he wrote for the business and finance sections of the print edition. He has also worked at the XPRIZE Foundation, U.S. Government Accountability Office, KCRW, and MLB Advanced Media (now Disney Streaming Services). He holds an MBA from UCLA Anderson, an MPP from UCLA Luskin and a BA in History from University of Michigan. Email him at samblake@dot.LA and find him on Twitter @hisamblake
https://twitter.com/hisamblake
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