Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg Business Week from Bloomberg Radio. Hello, I'm
Speaker 1: Jason Kelly and I'm Carol Masser. Welcome to the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week Extra. It's our weekly podcast bringing you one
Speaker 1: of our favorite interviews from the week. This week, we're
Speaker 1: catching up with Joe Lonsdale. We caught him on a
Speaker 1: very timely day, the day that palant Here, the company
Speaker 1: he co founded when he was twenty one years old,
Speaker 1: went public on the New York Stock Exchange. That's right.
Speaker 1: They've been working on this for seventeen years. The stock
Speaker 1: which went public via a direct listing on the New
Speaker 1: York Stock Exchange. It was up about thirty one percent,
Speaker 1: Jason in its first day of trading. Joe Man, We
Speaker 1: have gone to him several times. This is a company
Speaker 1: co founded with tech billionaire Peter Teal, but it's interesting.
Speaker 1: We love to talk to him about what they're doing
Speaker 1: in terms of data mining, but also where tech is
Speaker 1: going in the future. Want companies that you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's it's had a really strong last few years that
Speaker 1: it probably wasn't ready to be a public company. You know,
Speaker 1: ten years ago, maybe you could have got out in
Speaker 1: fourteene or fifteen. But I'm you know, I'm kind of
Speaker 1: glad a weighted because it's been such a strong last
Speaker 1: few years. It's really come into its own and it's
Speaker 1: a great time for its bout you're thirty eight. I
Speaker 1: just Adducent a message. I'm like, he's thirty eight. He
Speaker 1: started this when he was twenty one, and this isn't
Speaker 1: your first time at the rodeo. I mean, like this,
Speaker 1: it's pretty amazing. Um data and the use of data.
Speaker 1: We have more than we've ever thought, and there's more
Speaker 1: coming and it can just be a data dump or
Speaker 1: it can be data put to use. And I do
Speaker 1: think about specially Joe in light of the pandemic, like
Speaker 1: how do you guys at Palentin or think about it
Speaker 1: and how data can help us with some of these
Speaker 1: really big problems facing us, whether it's the pandemic, whether
Speaker 1: it's climate change, whether it's inequalities. No, you know, there's
Speaker 1: this man stiges concept from computer science from the nineteen
Speaker 1: sixties called man machine symbiosis, and the idea is there's
Speaker 1: things that people are better at, and there's things the
Speaker 1: computers are better app and the question is how you
Speaker 1: augment people, how you how you let people still do
Speaker 1: what they're the best at, well, the computers augmenting them.
Speaker 1: And in order to do that, when you have data
Speaker 1: from everywhere, you have to bring that data together and
Speaker 1: you have to put it into an environment where where
Speaker 1: it's it's been a form that's how the person is
Speaker 1: thinking about the data, and then less people delve into
Speaker 1: it intuitively and then collaborate around the data intuitaly. But
Speaker 1: you're really creating these information environments and in your right
Speaker 1: for all these hard problems, you need these information environments.
Speaker 1: You need to access I guess all that data was
Speaker 1: in your brain, so it can't possibly be you gotta
Speaker 1: do the next best thing and expose it the right
Speaker 1: way altogether, which is a very hard technology problems. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we'll have you solved it. We've done well well.
Speaker 1: You know here palace here is used by by a
Speaker 1: lot of governments and a lot of the biggest corporations
Speaker 1: around the world to solve their hardest problems. It's pounds here.
Speaker 1: You know. When the when the pandemic struck, you know,
Speaker 1: over thirty five countries turned to pounds here to immediately
Speaker 1: create for them a common operating picture that brought data
Speaker 1: together from hundreds of sources and did securely in a
Speaker 1: way to protected civil liberties protected you know, privacy. You
Speaker 1: only do what you're allowed to see, but then expose
Speaker 1: that data so leaders could make decisions. And you know,
Speaker 1: I don't think all of us agree with every decision
Speaker 1: every leaders made, but it was striking in country. It
Speaker 1: was talent here that they turned to to give that
Speaker 1: information so they could make decisions. So Joe, you went
Speaker 1: exactly where I wanted to go next, which was, you know,
Speaker 1: work with governments and work with the private sector. Um,
Speaker 1: there has been and you know this better than I do,
Speaker 1: controversy around um this notion of data and its use
Speaker 1: in surveillance quote unquote, at least that's how it's been positioned.
Speaker 1: Help us understand sort of strip out all the you know,
Speaker 1: rhetoric and everything around that, and help us understand are
Speaker 1: their misconceptions out there around what Palatier does and how
Speaker 1: it's used by governments. Of course, you know, they're One
Speaker 1: of the things I like is that if you're not
Speaker 1: doing anything important, is probably not gonna be anybody angry
Speaker 1: with you. And you know, and in this case, what
Speaker 1: you have before we started Palnce here We watched to
Speaker 1: the government and they had spent tens of billions of
Speaker 1: dollars year gathering data, and they had all sources of
Speaker 1: these giant I T services projects that were failed, and
Speaker 1: we said, can we build a single project of single
Speaker 1: platform that rather than have to build all these actually
Speaker 1: services went off and take years and take hundreds of
Speaker 1: millions of billions of dollars, can we do something that
Speaker 1: would work out of box to do this well during
Speaker 1: the data while enforcing the policy. And we actually, you know,
Speaker 1: build Palance here in a way to go above and beyond.
Speaker 1: Not only is it the greatest privacy engine in the world,
Speaker 1: but it has full auditorial automatically watches watchers, anyone involved
Speaker 1: can see how people are using the data. That's that
Speaker 1: The fair we had is that if you didn't have
Speaker 1: something like palentce here ben responding, you know, the terrors
Speaker 1: and it's the seventeen years ago, So that was what
Speaker 1: was on our minds and responding to that, you could
Speaker 1: actually become more like your enemy. That's what happens in warfare,
Speaker 1: is you become more like your enemy. In this case,
Speaker 1: it would have meant transforming our society unacceptably in giving
Speaker 1: out liberties. So we didn't want to have to give up.
Speaker 1: And so the the idea is that you had have
Speaker 1: a system in place to make sure it's enforcing the rules,
Speaker 1: to make sure whatever the policy is that steps up
Speaker 1: what's going to be allowed. And you know, I don't
Speaker 1: always agree with what the policy is in the US
Speaker 1: or allied countries, but but I but I do agree
Speaker 1: that it's a good thing to help America use the
Speaker 1: data it's allowed to use and to enforce the policy
Speaker 1: as we have. So when it comes to something like TikTok,
Speaker 1: then it sounds like you're pretty clear that maybe the
Speaker 1: U S is right in terms of having concerns about
Speaker 1: that type of a company. You know, it's been told
Speaker 1: me very clearly more than a decade ago and from
Speaker 1: my other spork and technology that I was not welcomed
Speaker 1: in China. It's the Chinese government was not going to
Speaker 1: allow big data platforms of any sort that are not
Speaker 1: owned by Chinese to operate and dominate there. They're definitely
Speaker 1: not gonna allow media platforms. They're definitely senor that. So
Speaker 1: if if they're censoring up like giving them giving a
Speaker 1: CCP access to tend a million of Americans uncensored display them. However,
Speaker 1: the CCP wants I can see why geopolitically that would
Speaker 1: be a bad situation to be in. I want to
Speaker 1: talk more about Silicon Valley and maybe as a way
Speaker 1: to get there, what does this listing and this sort
Speaker 1: of catalytic moment or this latest moment of the journey
Speaker 1: of Palenteer, what does that tell us about Silicon Valley today,
Speaker 1: the role of technology today here in because I gotta
Speaker 1: tell you, man, it's a funky time right now. It
Speaker 1: is that it is. It is a strange time we're
Speaker 1: living in. And you know, if you think, what does
Speaker 1: it tell us about what's going on? Well, technology, it's
Speaker 1: a part of the world. It's working, and it's a
Speaker 1: part of the world. There is a lot of confidence,
Speaker 1: a lot more than when we saw on TV last night.
Speaker 1: It's it's a fist. It's a part of the world
Speaker 1: where where you actually see growth, you actually see optimistic version,
Speaker 1: vision in the future of what's possible and and and
Speaker 1: you know that's why things value is highly it is
Speaker 1: in a lot of areas right now. Well, when you
Speaker 1: look at some of the big macro trends that are
Speaker 1: going on, in technology. Obviously, big data, as evidence by Palenteer,
Speaker 1: is something you're obviously really into. But what else do
Speaker 1: you find kind of interesting, whether it is, you know,
Speaker 1: autonomous vehicles, whether it's space exploration, or whether it's green
Speaker 1: technology that's going to figure out a way to you know,
Speaker 1: protect our environment. What else is it that you find
Speaker 1: it's really kind of interesting on our on your radar,
Speaker 1: and that you think Joe is going to be a
Speaker 1: bigger part of our world as well as our economy
Speaker 1: going forward and our technical potentially. Yeah, you know, there's
Speaker 1: there's there, there's a lot of these turns. The trend
Speaker 1: that really Palace here etenomizes is the fact that we
Speaker 1: have a lot more information than we ever had before.
Speaker 1: But the only way we're going to use that information
Speaker 1: well is to make it accessible and understandable to people.
Speaker 1: So what what what the trend Palunce here is about,
Speaker 1: and a lot of other companies were involved in as well,
Speaker 1: is these is these industries and these parts of the
Speaker 1: world only work right when we make sure that people
Speaker 1: are only through the day they're allowed to see, but
Speaker 1: they see it and understanding they can bring it together
Speaker 1: to lots of sources and they can act on it
Speaker 1: to making the industries work better. And that's that's true.
Speaker 1: We're talking about health care and making healthcare more efficient,
Speaker 1: and you know, there's so much stuff we could do,
Speaker 1: I think, to make healthcare costs half as much well
Speaker 1: delivering better results. And you know, some of those things
Speaker 1: are things we have to do policy wise, of course,
Speaker 1: and and and get rid of coronism and get rid
Speaker 1: of special interests. But a lot of those things are
Speaker 1: our technology problems. We need to get in there and
Speaker 1: we need to solve. And this is you know that
Speaker 1: there's a lot of things in that area. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm personally thinking about a lot of other areas who
Speaker 1: actually want to be a name one more. It might
Speaker 1: sound crazy, but I think Elon's a right about the tunnels.
Speaker 1: I think tunnels can save us trillions of dollars for
Speaker 1: our economy in terms of being making all the cities
Speaker 1: accessible and you can live really cheaply near by them.
Speaker 1: I think there's all sorts of cool things like that.
Speaker 1: So there's there's a lot stuff we could do. But
Speaker 1: the data seam is what Pounder was about today. Well,
Speaker 1: let me ask you something coming on the heels of
Speaker 1: the debate, and we know, um, your other co founder,
Speaker 1: Peter Teal has been a backer President Trump and Donald
Speaker 1: Trump specifically. When you think about politics, when you think
Speaker 1: about the parties, doesn't matter to you who's in office,
Speaker 1: whether it's on a regulatory front or whether it's on
Speaker 1: someone who has the vision to think about kind of
Speaker 1: where we need to go as a nation, because if
Speaker 1: you look around the world, I mean, I know what
Speaker 1: you said about China, you know, not necessarily wanting you
Speaker 1: guys in there. Are you when you were starting out?
Speaker 1: You know, whether it's a data company or so on.
Speaker 1: But I mean they definitely have a long term mission
Speaker 1: when it comes to high tech at this time. And
Speaker 1: I just do wonder how you think about politics with
Speaker 1: all of yeah, I mean, I really, I really wish
Speaker 1: there were a lot more computer scientists in Congress. I
Speaker 1: think we have way too many lawyers relatives to the
Speaker 1: proportion or population, and not nearly enough engineers. And I
Speaker 1: think one one advantage China has over US is there's
Speaker 1: a lot more engineers, uh, you know, running that country.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't want a country to be run by China.
Speaker 1: I'd prefer to live in a republic and a democracy
Speaker 1: but but yeah, I think we need to elect people
Speaker 1: who understand information, understand how to build the future, unders
Speaker 1: who are part of building the future. And you definitely
Speaker 1: don't see that from either party very much right now.
Speaker 1: And so, Joe, as you go out and look at
Speaker 1: investing in new companies, obviously, you know you sort of
Speaker 1: carry the lessons of Palenteer. You know, over this long
Speaker 1: period of time that that you've been involved and and
Speaker 1: you know your adult life has been spent associated with
Speaker 1: this company. What's the big lesson that you impart whether
Speaker 1: you're talking to a founder, whether you're talking to a
Speaker 1: team of engineers from this specific company which has by
Speaker 1: all means been successful and then gained another mark of
Speaker 1: success today. But what's what's the lesson you impart from it?
Speaker 1: You know, I think there's there's there's there's two really
Speaker 1: important lessons you have to say from this. One is,
Speaker 1: you know, I was at PayPal, and when I was
Speaker 1: at PayPal before Pounds, here we saw a lot of
Speaker 1: our pier starting companies right U Piers started linked In
Speaker 1: and Yelp in YouTube and Elon died based X and Test.
Speaker 1: All these people came from PayPal. There's fifteen of them.
Speaker 1: And and the lesson we learned that we really apply
Speaker 1: to Pounds here is the ones that work really have
Speaker 1: very tough engineering cultures. It's not just like you want
Speaker 1: good engineers. You actually want the best engineers in the world,
Speaker 1: and you want them to feel like it's their company
Speaker 1: and they're running it with you. So so one is
Speaker 1: all about focusing on being very top engineering culture and
Speaker 1: with engineers helping run the business too, I would say
Speaker 1: is you have to have a mission driven culture. You
Speaker 1: have to have a company where people are really proud
Speaker 1: of what they're doing when they wake up thinking about it,
Speaker 1: to go to sleep thinking about it. Because this is
Speaker 1: an important company and they've helped shape its values, they've
Speaker 1: helped shape its principles and and and it means a
Speaker 1: lot to them. And I think if you have built
Speaker 1: of those, you have a really good head start as
Speaker 1: a technologist. Such cool stuff. What do you do to
Speaker 1: like inspire your younger generation? Just got about forty seconds here,
Speaker 1: because you've got to think about that, right our future workforce.
Speaker 1: And I'm a daughter of an engineer. Jason is a
Speaker 1: son of an engineer. You know, we kind of grew
Speaker 1: up with there are lots of engineers everywhere, but it
Speaker 1: doesn't feel always that way. Today. We have to you know,
Speaker 1: we just had our third daughters. We have a newborn
Speaker 1: here at home, so I have three little girls and
Speaker 1: I would love it if, say, if they get excited
Speaker 1: about math and science and engineering, or obviously you're gonna
Speaker 1: support them whatever they do. But it's you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's one of those things where I think people have
Speaker 1: to understand there's an optimistic version of the future and
Speaker 1: just a vision of the future. There's so much synicism
Speaker 1: right now. There's so many people who who love to be,
Speaker 1: you know, just to take a dystopian view of the world.
Speaker 1: And I think we did teach people here's the amazing
Speaker 1: way the world can look, and here's the world is
Speaker 1: going to look if we embrace optimism, embrace technology and
Speaker 1: innovation and what's possible. And that was Joe Lunsdale, Palanteer
Speaker 1: co founder. I think one of the things we loved
Speaker 1: about him is he said world needs more engineers. If
Speaker 1: you're a lawyer, more engineers, and as children of engineers,
Speaker 1: I think we can go along with that. You were
Speaker 1: definitely in agreement with that. You've been listening to Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Business Week Extra. Be sure to tune into Bloomberg Business
Speaker 1: Week Radio that airs Monday through Friday, starting at two
Speaker 1: pm Wall Street time of Round Blotberg Radio. I'm Jason
Speaker 1: Kelly and I'm Carol Masser. This is Bloomberg