In this episode, we are joined by Elia Wallen, Founder and CEO of Engine (formerly Hotel Engine), the B2B travel booking platform that's streamlining how businesses manage their travel needs. From its origins as an internal tool for Elia's previous company, Travelers Haven, to becoming a $2.1 billion company, Engine has carved out a significant niche by focusing on serving SMBs with a frictionless approach to corporate travel management.

In this conversation, Elia shares his unconventional path from dropping out of college to founding multiple businesses, including the fascinating story of how Engine began as a side project that he almost shut down several times. We explore his philosophy of maintaining "strong conviction loosely held," his approach to fundraising (including a nail-biting near-miss with payroll), and why staying focused on doing one thing extremely well before expanding was crucial to Engine's success. Elia also offers valuable insights on bootstrapping versus raising capital, building in a non-tech hub, and why eliminating friction for customers has been central to Engine's competitive advantage in the crowded travel tech space.

(00:00) Introduction
(04:20) Where did Elia grow up and how did that shape his view of the world?
(04:42) Why did growing up in Naples push Elia to succeed?
(05:32) Did Elia always think he was going to become a founder?
(06:28) How did earlier founding experiences shape his view of leadership?
(07:28) What is Engine's core product?
(08:51) How does someone break into the corporate travel space?
(10:05) How did Elia think about scaling the go-to-market motion?
(11:59) How did Elia position Engine as it scaled?
(13:55) How did Elia and his leadership team discern which was the right scaling direction to go?
(15:57) How does a founder balance extreme focus while managing two businesses?
(18:29) How was building a company in Denver, and what prompted the decision to move to the Bay Area?
(20:42) How did fundraising begin for Engine?
(22:40) What is a moment when things didn't go as planned during Elia's founder journey?
(25:41) How did Engine think about building out both the integration suite and the business model?
(28:25) How will AI affect Engine's business model and policies?
(30:07) How is Engine thinking about diversifying customer benefits?
(31:35) How is Elia feeling about corporate travel as a sector for growth and opportunity?
(32:04) Where does Elia think Engine and he will be in five years?
(33:20) Who is a woman in Elia's life that has had a profound impact on him and his career?

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Brought to you by Perkins Coie and Mercury.*
*Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve Bank & Trust; Members FDIC.

WX Productions

Welcome back to The Room Podcast! In this episode, we sit down with Matan Grinberg and Eno Reyes, co-founders of Factory, a company building the command center for software development. With backgrounds in physics and computer science, this dynamic duo is unifying all engineering contexts from GitHub to Notion, empowering product and engineering teams to collaborate with autonomous AI systems. Their impressive journey has already attracted $20 million in funding from Sequoia, Lux Capital, and Mantis Ventures, positioning them at the forefront of the AI-native movement.

During our conversation, Matan and Eno share their unexpected journey from Princeton classmates who barely interacted to co-founders who launched their company just eight days after reconnecting at an AI hackathon. They dive deep into how AI is shifting the center of gravity in software development from coding to understanding and planning, the challenges of enterprise adoption, and why they believe we're currently at "the lowest number of developers that will ever be for the rest of human history." Their insightful perspectives on building an AI-native company and transforming developer workflows offer valuable lessons for founders navigating the rapidly evolving AI landscape.

(00:00) Introduction
(03:56) Where did Matan and Eno grow up, and how did it shape their worldview?
(06:29) Did Eno always think he'd become a founder?
(07:01) Was it inevitable that Matan and Eno would start something together?
(07:36) How did Matan and Eno end up in this room today?
(09:15) Was it inevitable for them to start a company together after meeting at Princeton?
(11:26) Did Matan always see himself becoming a founder?
(11:33) How did Factory come to life after they reconnected?
(16:05) Did the Factory demo work for their Sequoia pitch?
(16:32) What was in Factory's original deck and demo?
(18:29) What was the biggest challenge in getting developers to use Factory?
(20:22) How does the Factory team see AI shaping the role of developers in the next five years?
(22:04) What was Factory's go-to-market strategy and first big customer win?
(30:06) What fundraising advice do they have for AI founders looking to raise a Series A?
(32:19) What does it mean to be AI-native from Factory's perspective?
(37:59) What inefficiencies did they see in developer workflows before starting Factory?
(40:00) Does Factory care about chip technology like Nvidia versus Traum?
(42:09) Where do they see Factory in five years?
(45:06) Is Factory hiring?
(45:31) What are they most excited about on Factory's roadmap?
(49:18) Who is a woman that had a profound impact on Matan and his career?
(50:33) Who is a woman that had a profound impact on Eno and his career?

For The Room Podcast in your inbox every week, subscribe to our newsletter.
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Check out our guide to podcasting here!
Don't forget to subscribe to our channel on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music!

Brought to you by Perkins Coie and Mercury.*
*Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve Bank & Trust; Members FDIC.

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This week, we're excited to speak with Tiancheng Lou, Co-Founder and CTO of Pony AI, a leading autonomous vehicle technology company that went public in November 2024. As a two-time Google Code Jam champion and former engineer at both Google X and Baidu's Autonomous Driving Division, Tiancheng brings exceptional technical expertise to his pioneering work in developing driverless technology with over 40 million kilometers of autonomous driving testing.

In this episode, Tiancheng shares fascinating insights into the evolution of autonomous vehicle technology, explaining the difference between level two and level four autonomy and why highway driving is more challenging than city driving for AI. We explore Pony AI's virtual driver technology, their approach to commercialization, and how they're training AI through imitation learning and reinforcement learning in virtual environments. Tiancheng also offers valuable advice for founders on balancing technical ambition with market realities, the importance of finding the right co-founder with aligned visions, and why success can't be copied but failures can be avoided. Tune in for a deep dive into the future of transportation and the journey of building a billion-dollar autonomous technology company.

(00:00) Introduction
(04:09) Where did Tiancheng grow up, and how did that shape his view of the world?
(04:43) Did Tiancheng always think he would become a founder?
(05:11) How did Tiancheng's competitive programming background influence his approach to tech?
(06:08) How did Tiancheng find out about these competitive programming competitions?
(08:46) How did Tiancheng get into the autonomous vehicle space?
(11:22) What advice would Tiancheng give listeners on how to break into the autonomous tech space?
(13:16) What was the "aha moment' when Tiancheng realized he wanted to start Pony.ai?
(14:54) What were the differences between the American and Chinese autonomous vehicle industries?
(16:25) What is setting the new virtual driver technologies apart?
(18:06) What sets the technologies for autonomous trucks and taxis apart from average consumer cars?
(20:56) How do you prepare an autonomous car for unexpected events that may happen on the road?
(23:24) When did Tiancheng first put an autonomous car on the road?
(24:02) How have consumer reviews been of Pony.ai vehicles?
(26:15) How does Pony.ai prioritize their developments?
(29:23) Who was the first person to say yes to investing in Pony.ai?
(31:02) What advice does Tiancheng have for first-time founders?\
(32:30) How does Pony adapt to different regulatory environments across markets?
(34:40) How important is mass production and scaling of autonomous vehicles to Pony.ai and the overall industry?
(36:01) Are we now in the commercialization era of Robo Taxis?
(37:05) Is there an amount of autonomous driving data or a certain metric that Pony.ai aims to collect?\
(40:27) What are Tiancheng's thoughts on the future of AI?
(42:03) What are Tiancheng's thoughts on Deep Seek?
(43:41) What's the next market Pony.ai will be launching in, and what are their goals for global market expansion?
(44:19) What's next for Tiancheng personally?
(44:44) Who is a woman in Tiancheng's life that had a profound impact on him and his career?

For The Room Podcast in your inbox every week, subscribe to our newsletter.
Follow us on Instagram
Follow us on TikTok
Check out our guide to podcasting here!
Don't forget to subscribe to our channel on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Music!

Brought to you by Perkins Coie and Mercury.*
*Mercury is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services provided by Choice Financial Group and Evolve Bank & Trust; Members FDIC.

WX Productions