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Martin Casado has lived through multiple tech waves—first as a founder, now as a16z’s leading voice on AI and infrastructure. He helped pioneer software-defined networking, then moved from academia to entrepreneurship, and today backs founders building at the frontier of technology as a General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz. In this conversation, Martin shares his unique perspective on the AI boom, his market-first investment philosophy, and why he believes we’re still in the early days of AI’s impact.
We explore:
Martin’s path from game engines and simulations to investing at Andreessen Horowitz
Why Martin believes we’re only in “1996” of the AI boom cycle with years to run before any bubble
Why Martin approaches investing “from markets in” rather than “from companies out”
Why the AI coding market represents a potential $3 trillion opportunity
The transformation of Andreessen Horowitz from a small generalist partnership to a specialized 600-person organization
The concerning dominance of Chinese companies in open source AI models
Why Martin thinks AGI discussions encourage “lazy thinking” and obscure meaningful conversations
How World Labs is solving the 3D representation problem that could unlock robotics, VR, and more
Explore the episode
Timestamps
(00:00) Intro
(04:50) Martin’s early career
(08:35) Martin’s shift from academia to founding his own company during an economic downturn
(11:25) The story behind Martin joining Andreessen Horowitz
(17:55) Ben Horowitz’s most impactful advice
(19:49) How Andreessen Horowitz has transformed since 2016
(22:20) Why product experience matters more than technical prowess for infrastructure investing
(26:26) Martin’s market-first investment philosophy
(28:39) Andreessen Horowitz’s framework for assessing founders and startups
(33:14) Why Martin thinks Hock Tan may be the best CEO today
(35:18) The controversy around non-consensus investing in early stages
(38:42) Why today’s AI boom reminds Martin of the mid-’90s tech environment
(44:38) How today’s AI boom differs from 2021’s tech bubble
(47:10) Why the promise of AI in organizations remains largely unrealized
(50:29) How Martin uses AI for coding and as a reading thought partner
(52:56) Why Martin doesn’t use AI for writing
(53:24) Martin’s interest in Eisenhower and historical parallels to today
(55:33) Two equally important paths for AI’s future
(58:33) Why Cursor stood out as the leader in AI coding tools
(01:01:14) The lack of inherent defensibility in AI and how to build moats
(01:03:30) World Labs’ mission to transform 2D images into 3D environments
(01:06:42) 3D’s emerging use cases and why the VR market may expand
(01:11:50) Why Martin isn’t an “AGI guy” and how the term erodes conversation quality
(01:14:59) How seeing AI as a continuum creates room for future products and investment
(01:16:28) The security and regulatory challenges of Chinese open-source AI models
(01:19:23) Final meditations
Follow Martin Casado
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/martincasado/
X: https://x.com/martin_casado
Resources and episode mentions
Books
The Weirdest People in the World: https://www.amazon.com/WEIRDest-People-World-Psychologically-Particularly/dp/1250800072/
The Beginning of Infinity: Explanations That Transform the World: https://www.amazon.com/Beginning-Infinity-Explanations-Transform-World/dp/0143121359
Statistical Consequences of Fat Tails: Real World Preasymptotics, Epistemology, and Applications: https://www.amazon.com/Statistical-Consequences-Fat-Tails-Preasymptotics/dp/B0CD8X5YC5
The Art of Doing Science and Engineering: Learning to Learn: https://www.amazon.com/Art-Doing-Science-Engineering-Learning/dp/1732265178
The End of History and the Last Man: https://www.amazon.com/End-History-Last-Man/dp/0743284550
People
Andy Rachleff on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachleff/
Ben Horowitz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/behorowitz/
Marc Andreessen on X: https://x.com/pmarca
Mike Moritz on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelmoritz/
John Doerr on X: https://x.com/johndoerr
Peter Thiel on X: https://x.com/peterthiel
Hock Tan on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hock-tan/
Dwight D. Eisenhower: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dwight_D._Eisenhower
Ben Mildenhall on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ben-mildenhall-86b4739b/
Christoph Lassner on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christoph-lassner-475a669b/
Justin Johnson on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/justin-johnson-41b43664/
Yann LeCun on X: https://x.com/ylecun
Other resources
Andreessen Horowitz: https://a16z.com/
R.I.P. Good Times: https://articles.sequoiacap.com/rip-good-times
Martin’s post on X about non consensus investing: https://x.com/martin_casado/status/1959485916894167162
Terra Incognita: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terra_incognita
Beware the AI Experimentation Trap: https://hbr.org/2025/08/beware-the-ai-experimentation-trap
Cursor: https://cursor.com/
Grok: https://x.ai/grok
Warren Court: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_Court#Historically_significant_decisions
CodeX: https://openai.com/codex/
Genie3: https://deepmind.google/discover/blog/genie-3-a-new-frontier-for-world-models/
Midjourney: https://www.midjourney.com/
WorldLabs: https://www.worldlabs.ai/
Suno: https://suno.com/
GitHub Copilot: https://github.com/features/copilot
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